Brussels, 17/02/2004 (Agence Europe) - Although preference for the English language will increase with enlargement (69% of the candidates to open competitions from the new Member States have chosen English, 18% German and 13% French), the European Commission sought, on Tuesday, to justify its linguistic interpretation and translation policy while defending the "democratic right" to linguistic diversity. According to the Commission, the EU is unique in that it is the only organisation where all citizens may speak in their own language.
The Commission mainly took stock of the recruitment procedure for interpreters and translators and gave a long series of data illustrating the challenge of enlargement for the European institutions, first of all for translation: - the number of official languages will increase by 82%, from 11 to 20; - the number of pages translated should rise by about 40% (1.480 million pages in 2003, 2.065 million pages in 2004, then 2.370 million in 2005); - the additional staff required will be 60 translators per language (110/language including freelance translators and support staff); - the cost of translation at the Commission will go from EUR 230 million today to just under EUR 320 million after enlargement (EUR 550 million to EUR 808 million for all European institutions).
As far as interpretation is concerned, the Commission specifies that: - needs are assessed at 40 extra interpreters for each new language and per day; - the aim is to employ 75 interpreters in 2004 and a total of 180 before 2007; - at the present time, 54 interpreters (48 official and 8 freelance) take language courses to learn the languages of the ten future Member Sates and Turkish.