Home To The World
Multiculturalism spawns communication boom
Translation services have thrived on the GTA's diversity

By Madhavi Acharya

Toronto Star Business Reporter

Sometimes the translation business is like detective work. The insurance adjuster needed someone who could speak Igbo, a dialect native to southern Nigeria. The Word Exchange knew it didn't have anyone in its stable of interpreters who speaks this language, so the staff started working the phones, calling contacts at community centres.

"One lead leads to the next and eventually we'll talk to a person who is willing to do it," says Serge Gingras, president of the Toronto translation company.

Someone was found within the hour.

"Sometimes it's just luck, but it's also knowing where to look."

Translation and interpretation companies have been around for decades, but Toronto's ethnic and cultural diversity has bred and nurtured a boom in this multi-million-dollar industry. "We wouldn't be in business if it weren't for the multiculturalism of the city," Gingras says.

The Greater Toronto Area boasts translation companies of all sizes, from firms that specialize in one or two languages to those offering more than 100, slugging it out in this fiercely competitive market.

Translation services have long been an essential tool for law firms, insurance companies and the like, but now a wider variety of businesses are discovering that removing a language barrier can help seal the deal.

"It's all about communicating the way their customer wants," Gingras says.

At Accident Injury Management clinics, using interpreters to interview people who have been involved in accidents just makes communication easier, says manager Michelle Rach.

Adjectives describing the precise nature of an ache or an injury are not exactly typical fodder in an English as a Second Language class, Rach says.

"Without an interpreter, we just wouldn't be able to do our job. We wouldn't be to say, `Describe your pain sensation. Does it radiate? Is it an ache? Is it tingly?' " she says.

"You don't usually use `tingling' and `numbness' in your everyday conversations. But it's part of our everyday communication here."

Demand for various languages for verbal interpreting is strongly influenced by immigration in the Toronto area, while written translation is affected by international trade, says Paul Penzo, operations manager of All Languages. Where Italian, Portuguese and Spanish used to be in high demand, now it's Cantonese, Mandarin, Somali and Punjabi.

Across the industry, spoken interpretation generally runs about $45 to $110 per hour. Written translation is about 20 to 50 cents per word, depending on the complexity of the document and turn-around time. Interpreters and translaters earn a cut of the agency's fee.

"The research can be unbelievable. You could spend two hours on one word. That's why translation is charged that way," Gingras says.

This can be a high-pressure business, full of potential trouble if a job isn't done right. Imagine leaving out a word on a label for a bottle of household cleanser, Gingras says. Now you're telling people a poisonous product is safe to drink.

"The liabilities could be enormous if there were a recall of a million bottles or something. That's why you have to be very careful about proofreading."

While prospective interpreters are fluent in their mother tongues, agencies also have to make sure candidates can speak English properly.

"We don't care if they have an accent or anything like that,'' says Gingras. ``It's mostly being able to say what they need to have said in English without putting in a nuance that might not be there."

When the Word Exchange set up shop, the firm made a point of using accredited services, then still a foreign concept.

"People didn't know there were such things as accreditation. If you asked for an interpreter, you didn't know what you were getting," Gingras says.

The Word Exchange now has about 1,000 freelance interpreters and translators on file with a core of about 75 to 100 who are called in regularly.

The company makes a point of using accredited interpreters and translators, with the occasional exception, like finding someone who speaks Igbo in a hurry.

Accreditation comes from the attorney-general's office, which administers translation exams every February, based on what language needs the office perceives in specific regions. The Immigration and Refugee Board also registers interpreters.

"Sometimes accreditation is not the best thing. Experience is more important," argues rival Penzo.

All Languages, which has been around for about 30 years, provides translation services for a wide variety of clients, including manufacturers, wholesalers, travel agencies, lawyers and doctors.

It's more important to send interpreters who have experience with legal or medical matters to those types of assignments, Penzo says.

At Global Translation and Interpreters Services Inc., in business since 1972, the name of the game is specialization.

"A lot of companies take on all kinds of work, everything from résumés to contract to label packaging. We stuck to law firms and insurance companies," says office manager Tim Koressis.

While it's difficult to say where the industry is going, it's clear that computer software won't be putting translators out of business, as some observers have suggested, Koressis says.

"When a machine does it, you still have to have a human who can understand the context of what's being said and how to put it correctly. It's never going to come out 100 per cent."

"For so long, our country and the world markets have been using English as the first language of choice for international commerce. You can talk in English, but when it comes right down to it, people think in the language that is most natural to them," says Maureen Mitchell, president of CanTalk Canada, one of the newer Canadian firms in the field. CanTalk Canada promises a new level of competition with quick, cheap, over-the-phone interpretation. The company has a Winnipeg call centre but with the help of some high-tech telecommunications tools, is striving to build a presence in cyberspace.

"If you're using them to the fullest potential, it really doesn't matter where you are," Mitchell says.

The company has developed a line of international operator services, available in 83 countries worldwide and currently manages up to 150,000 calls a month.

"We see it as an emerging market that hasn't yet reached its full potential," Mitchell says. "It's just scratching the surface."