The language instinct

Motivated students

"However, China is such a big country and there is no shortage of geniuses. So you have a lot of smart, motivated Chinese students who study English very hard. So training interpreters should not be a problem," said Dawrant.

Li Yuanxing is one of a group of interpreters who've shown great potential. The second-year postgraduate at the Sino-EU Interpreter Training Center, which recruits only 10 students a year for its professional training program, won the top prize in the simultaneous interpretation competition at the All-China Interpreting Contest this year.

"Sometimes I still have language problems, such as when I attended the middle term which is examined by EU supervisors," said Li at a translation forum hosted by the University of International Business and Economics.

The Sino-EU Interpreter Training Center, along with the Graduate Institute of Interpretation and Translation at Shanghai International Studies University, which uses AIIC members and is supported by the EU, offers interpretation programs that strictly match the professional criteria. Students may have the chance to train in Brussels. The schools recruit only 10 students each from hundreds or even thousands of candidates.

"Anyone who graduates from these schools has already attained a certain level," said Peart. "We hire not only AIIC members, but also those who represent top quality."

"And we have a lot of people to choose from: those who graduate from these schools or those returning from Brussels."

"For 20 years, we have trained two groups of 10 annually, and most of them are now working for Chinese ministries or the EU. Because the EU uses the most experienced interpreters, we have interpreters in 23 languages. So it is very complicated. We have a huge interpretation department, bigger than the UN, bigger than anywhere else. We have to undertake interpretation into so many languages," said William Fingleton, head of press and information at the Delegation of the European Union to China.

What's the problem?

"Ten is a very good number. In good interpretation schools, there are usually fewer than 10 students. When you recruit students, the standards should be very strict so you can ensure they are people who are likely to meet the required graduation standard. The course is very tough, they have taken extremely rigorous exams to ensure they master all the skills quickly," said Peart.

"I am very suspicious of any course that says it has 30 or 40 graduate students a year. Their students are not able to interpret at meetings in the required manner," he added.

At present, 159 Chinese universities offer master's degrees in translation and interpretation, and on average every year they recruit 30 candidates each for postgraduate studies.

"You also have to be realistic when you decide how many conference interpreters you really need and how many can you realistically train," said Dawrant, who was a professor and chair of the department of conference interpretation at Shanghai International Studies University from 2003 to 2011.

Moreover, some graduates are unlikely to make the grade. "I don't think they are qualified enough to work as interpreters. Nor do I think the market needs many interpreters. If you look at training courses, you can quickly learn how serious they are by looking at the curriculum."

He said if graduates are not working as professional interpreters 3 or 5 years after leaving the school, but are instead employed by companies or government departments, one may ask why the training course exists at all. Is the selection of students too lax? Or is the training course not good enough? Leaving aside those questions, it may simply be that the market isn't big enough to support so many graduates.

"It's true that there is a shortage of excellent interpreters," said Peart. "I think the main problem is that there is a lack of understanding of the importance of good interpreters. If you want to have a successful meeting or conference, you need good interpreters. But that's usually the last thing people think of. They will think of everything else and then after all of that they think about the interpreters."

"It is a matter of quality. It is a significant cost, but when they realize, it's too late."