London ( CNN ) -- Summer may be drawing to a close but for the eurozone 's economy , spring has only just begun . After 18 months in recession , the single currency bloc finally posted some much needed growth in the form of a 0.3 % expansion of gross domestic product for the second quarter . Watch more : Europe 's new challenges . Brussels was quick to take the credit , claiming its policies of structural reforms had finally started to take hold , whilst the investor community cautioned more work would be needed to ensure the nascent recovery could be sustained . The truth is that yes , things are looking up but it depends where you are in Europe and there 's certainly little room for complacency . Predictably , growth in the eurozone 's two biggest economies , Germany and France , underpinned the region 's revival . But a closer look at individual countries further down the pecking order throws up some unexpected surprises , which I 've outlined below . Read more : Can Europe drive a new industrial revolution ? Portugal , a nation whose profligacy and lack of competitiveness led to it being bailed out , grew 1.1 % while the Netherlands , famous for its fiscal prudence , shrank 0.2 % -- its fourth straight quarter of contraction . The economies of Italy and Spain remained stuck in reverse gear as well . So much for the stereotypes and the hard and fast crisis response rules which have taken endless European Union summits to draft . Reading the data one would be forgiven for thinking three years of austerity never happened . In fact it was n't even mentioned once in Olli Rehn 's own communique . Watch more : Why Europe 's problems will come back . And yet the challenge for Europe 's leaders at a time when some of them are coming up for re-election will be to seize upon the green shoots without dropping the ball on spending cuts . In Germany , which will face a general election next month , business groups are already lobbying any incoming government to boost investment spending . And in France , large firms are still loath to hire due to the government 's lack of fiscal clarity and President Hollande 's new punitive tax regime . A CEO of one FTSE 100 business with over 60,000 staff across the EU told me Europe was in recovery , and that presented opportunities -- but confidence was needed to ensure the upswing really took hold . Read more : Meet tiny nation bucking eurozone 's pain . However , as any business leader will also tell you , confidence is an intangible currency . Indeed , the next challenge for Europe 's top brass will be to convince companies the future is bright enough to start hiring again . Across the eurozone and the broader EU as a whole , firms have been amassing huge cash reserves which , in the face of uncertainty , have been neither spent on new machinery nor on the hiring of new staff . Such businesses will need more evidence of a true lift than a mere quarter of expansion before they are to undertake any hefty capital expenditure . The eurozone crisis has dominated the political and economic sphere for more than three years . During that time millions have lost their jobs creating a legacy of high unemployment and long-term underemployment which will take years to tackle . With more than a quarter of their populations out of work today , countries like Spain and Greece will probably still finding solutions to their jobs crisis by the time the next recession rolls around . Explore : How the crisis made the rich richer and the poor poorer . That 's not counting a whole generation who missed its first step on the job ladder . If Europe really has learned its lesson , business and government should start setting the wheels in motion now to work together and retrain staff for the jobs available today and tomorrow . More jobs would boost domestic consumption and help provide a counterweight to export-dependency of the growth generators like Germany . But to hire , businesses need to be offered incentives . One incentive is a stable , more robust economy . Another is a benign interest rate environment , which is why what would really give this recovery legs is a rate cut by the end of this year . Mario Draghi , take note . Read more : Central bankers and the games of wordplay .
After 18 years in recession , the eurozone finally experienced some much needed stability . Things are looking up but it depends where you are in Europe , and there 's little room for complacency . The challenge for Europe 's leaders will be to build upon the green shoots . Now , the bloc 's business leaders need confidence , but that is an intangible currency .