Our CEO Inge Rätsep was re-elected to the Management Board of the Association of Estonian Translation Companies. We asked Inge what motivates her to engage in community work in addition to running a business.
I am a passionate translation enthusiast and have also been active in various translation-related ventures in the past, including as part of the Management Board of the AETC. In addition to developing my own business, I also try to look at the bigger picture. I truly want the translation industry as a whole to evolve and keep up with the times, so it requires a lot of effort from oneself. After all, no one else from outside the field is going to push it further.
In my opinion, the Estonian translation industry is currently facing great changes. Technology, including machine translation, has come to stay in our industry, and as market players we need to adapt quickly in a changed business environment. I also think that the market will be divided significantly in the coming years. It is more than likely that some international big players will come to Estonia to operate here on a permanent basis soon.
The main role of the AETC is to involve and inform people. The aim of the coming years is to expand membership and increase cooperation with professional organisations in neighbouring countries. There is also a lot of work to be done in developing cooperation with the state, both in terms of technology and public procurements. I am pleased to see that, year by year, there is a growing awareness of the importance of translation services in the state communications. An excellent example is the first survey of Estonian translators, which was carried out this autumn in cooperation between the AETC, the European Commission, and the University of Tartu. It is also encouraging to note that cooperation between the Institute of the Estonian Language, the Estonian Ministry of Justice, and other organisations and translation agencies is increasing. I would also like to highlight the fact that this year already marks the fourth consecutive year we have been teaching the students of translation studies at Tallinn University, so we are also taking care of the next generation in the field of translation.
My dream is to have a broad-based professional organisation, bringing together translation agencies, as well as freelance translators and language technology companies. By working together, we have more inspiring ideas, more people to introduce such ideas, and also more people we can help in the sector.
