EU is trying to bridge communication gap by recruiting 1000 linguists

The numerous EU institutions have developed a feeling that they cannot fully communicate their aims and prospective to EU citizens - a feeling that was deepened by the French and Dutch saying No to the proposed European constitution.

Now the EU is taking measures to bridge the communication gap, which is mainly caused by the large number of official languages spoken within its member states, and is doubling its resources to translating its websites into all official languages.

"These measures are expected to make translation become an integral part of the policy making process," writes EUpolitix.com. However, the use of Eastern European languages will not extend to all EU documents; internal texts within the institutions will remain predominantly in English, German and French. Only financial statements and legal documents will be translated into all official languages.

This ambitious plan, however, raises concern over the quality of thosetranslations. With a permanent staff of 1,300 linguists the EU'stranslation service is the largest in the world. By using all available recruitment options EU's translations service has recruited over 1000 linguists this year, including 429 permanent and 660 freelancing translators by June, 30th, mostly for the recently added service languages like Czech, Estonian, Hungarian, Latvian, Maltese, Polish, Slovenian,and Slovak. Still the current number of translators is 22 short of the target set for January2005, but it is expected to be reached by September 2005.

Recruited permanent Translators by language

This autumn interviews with Bulgarian and Romanian translators will be held in order to ensure the availability of sufficient linguists for the two new member states by January 2007.

Meanwhile the Austrian newspaper Der Standard reports that the European Commission is planning to use the citizen's everyday language to get EU policies across. "Eurospeak", a language used within the EU institutions consisting of abbreviations and special terms that are not understood by "outsiders", should vanish from the institutions' publications.

With more attractive website and the creation of hotlines the EU is especially addressing young people. The information network "Europe Direct" is already available for callers from the 25 member states. The EU sends 180 Million Euro on public relations each year.

A list with Frequently Asked Questions (and their answers) concerning the "strategy to match supply and demand" is available at Press Releases Rapid.

Sources: EUpolitix.com, derStandard.com