Did you know that 72% of the Earth’s surface is covered in water, and yet only 2.8% of it is fresh? Were you aware that an individual needs around 50 liters of water per day to live in dignity, but consumes an average of 137 liters? And what of the nearly 2.2 billion people who live without access to drinking water? The Chamber of Trades and Crafts (CMA) of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region (PACA) is raising awareness of this issue. The CMA have organized a seminar to help French and Italian companies acquire skills to reduce their water consumption. Cultures Connection attended the event to offer our simultaneous interpretation services between French and Italian.
Environmental Challenges Facing Local Companies
The PACA region’s Chamber of Trades supports local businesses in the development of their services, as well as ongoing training and learning in management and innovation. The Chamber shared their data on the current global water situation this past January 10 during a meeting with Chambers of Commerce and several French and Italian universities.
These institutions are in charge of developing a project for 140 companies in the food sector to reduce water consumption. Current data estimates a daily per capita water consumption of 151 liters in France and 213 liters in Italy. The Chamber of Trades strives to reduce these numbers.
Two Languages United by Simultaneous Interpretation
Cultures Connection, whose head office is in Nice, prepared a team of two professional interpreters to work as a pair. Equipped with 2 microphones and 25 headphones, our interpreter duo ensured the meeting ran smoothly. Thanks to their work, all participants understood every single detail.
This was an operational meeting to finalize decisions on the administrative management of the project. Organizers sought to improve execution and its communication. Conversations covered a wide range of technical and commercial concepts that required advanced knowledge of environmental, scientific and business issues on the part of our interpreters.
Our interpreting professionals took turns; 20 minutes on, 20 minutes off. Taking frequent breaks is how professionals guarantee the quality of their work and avoid mental fatigue. Simultaneous interpretation services take place are while the interlocutor speaks, in order to make communication more fluid. This is only possible with microphones and headphones.
They had to interpret from French into Italian and from Italian into French, according to the nationality of the person who asked a question or was about to explain something about the project. All participants were from either the PACA region of France or the Liguria and Piedmont regions of Italy.
Cultures Connection has successfully provided a new interpretation service for international organizations and is now at the disposal of the Chamber of Trades and Crafts of the PACA region, who will soon be meeting again with representatives of the Chambers of Commerce and universities to continue moving the initiative forward. France will soon celebrate World Water Day on March 22 to raise awareness of the global freshwater crisis. There is still much to be done.
