Message from the President – July 2020
Dear Members, Colleagues and Industry Partners
Only half way through the year and we have had more surprises than in the past decade altogether. Albert Einstein said: “In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity” and that’s what we have been seeing in our industry in the last 4 months: courageous pivoting and adapting by our members to adjust to the new reality of COVID-19 era. Whilst virtually all face to face interpreting was cancelled overnight, remote simultaneous interpreting and remote video interpreting rose to the forefront. Not a substitution of onsite interpreting but a much needed lifeline for the industry to facilitate business continuity for our clients and interpreters. The translation orders were impacted as well in the hard hit industries of hospitality and tourism but localisation localisation in e-commerce rose with increased retail going online and international to counteract the absence of physical buyers.
As the world continues to navigate the far-reaching consequences of COVID-19, the priority is clearly to keep everyone safe including our CALD communities here in Australia. This is yet another sector where our members have been actively involved in facilitating multilingual information to LOTE speakers across the country. And more is required. The latest COVID-19 outbreak in Victoria showed how important it is to ensure every Australian has access to information in their own language and how crucial the work of our translation and interpreting industry is. And yet it seems we are still shortselling ourselves and not highlighting enough the impact multilingual message delivery has to the safety, health and economy of the country.
AALC has also been active during the past months by running Webinars on new technologies, remote interpreting and forging new partnerships with sister organisations to enable our members to take advantage of industry events, seminars and workshops that have all gone online. AALC was already partner of GALA and ALC and has now signed MoUs with ELIA and EUATC as well. Watch out for the announcements and the detailed benefits on our website.
Stay safe and healthy and here’s to a Happy New Financial Year to all of us.
This article was first published in the AALC newsletter. Drop us a line and receive all articles as they are published.