In an interview with Xinhua, the minister said that total investment in Greece went up by 9.5 percent in 2006 in comparison with 2005 while in 2006, Foreign Direct Investment reached 4.2 billion euros (5.754 billion US dollars), which is two percent of GDP, nine times higher than 2005. Exports also went up by 13.7 percent in 2005 and by 18.2 percent in 2006.

Alogoskoufis said the increased economic activity related to preparing the Olympic Games helped create numerous jobs in the period leading up to the Games and the employment is increasing even three years after the Games.

The unemployment rate had fallen from 10.5 percent in 2004 to 8.9 percent in 2006. This was the first time that unemployment fell below 9 percent since 1998, said the minister.

Tourism infrastructure was greatly upgraded to host the Olympic Games. In 2005, according to the Bank of Greece, revenues from tourism amounted to 11 billion euros, 6.1 percent of the GDP, presenting an increase of 6.7 percent as compared to 2004. Greek now ranks fourth in Europe in net income from tourism.

The minister said the preparation for the Olympic Games led to some inflationary pressures in Greek, however, Greece managed to maintain high growth rates despite the expectation of an economic slowdown after the Olympic Games.

He said the government introduced a series of structural reforms since 2004. "A tax reform reduced corporate taxes from 35 percent to 25 percent and gave a significant boost to entrepreneurship and investment, "said Alogoskoufis.

"The new Investment Incentives Law, the new framework for Public-Private Partnerships, the privatizations agenda and other reforms also played a key role in maintaining high growth rates. Economic growth reached 3.7 percent in 2005 and 4.3 percent in 2006, which is very robust by European standards," he added.

The minister pointed out that Greece faced mainly fiscal problems after the hosting of the Olympic Games, primarily because of the size of its economy.

"The budget needed to host the Olympics was disproportionately big compared to the size of the Greek economy. China on the other hand has a much larger economy and I don't believe it will come across similar challenges," said Alogoskoufis.