International and professional associations help share best practices and protect the interpreting profession.
This is not an exhaustive list. It includes our traditional partners in the world of conference interpreting. For other partners please see conference sign language, public service and legal interpreting.
Professional Associations
AIIC - Association Internationale d'Interprètes de Conférence
AIIC is the only global association of conference interpreters, and brings together over 3,000 professionals from every continent, who are listed in a directory. For over 60 years, AIIC has promoted high standards of quality and ethics in the profession and represented the interests of its practitioners. AIIC activities and projects aim to help individual practitioners and the worldwide community of interpreters meet the challenges of a rapidly changing world.
FIT - International Federation of Translators
FIT is an is an international grouping of associations of translators, interpreters and terminologists. More than 100 professional associations and training institutes are affiliated, representing more than 80,000 translators in 55 countries. The goal of the Federation is to promote professionalism in the disciplines it represents.
EST - European Society for Translation Studies
Founded in Vienna in 1992, the Society now has members in more than 46 countries. It functions as a network for research, a forum for exchange, and a center for research resources. Its aims, as stated in its Constitution, are to foster research in translation and interpreting, to promote further education for teachers of translation and interpreting, to offer advice on the training of translators and interpreters to facilitate contacts between T&I practitioners and relevant academic institutions. The EST is an international network of translation and interpreting scholars.
International networks and associations
IAMLADP - International Annual Meeting on Language Arrangements, Documentation and Publications
IAMLADP was set up some 35 years ago by the United Nations Headquarters. It is an international forum and network of managers of international organisations employing conference and language service providers – mainly translators and interpreters. The IAMLADP annual meeting is an opportunity for the IAMLADP organisations to meet at the same place, take stock of the work accomplished by the various Working groups (WGs) and Task Forces (TFs), exchange information, ideas and best practices and network with each other.
DG Interpretation enjoys an excellent reputation among IAMLADP members, more particularly for the WG on Training activities which was proposed by DG Interpretation, its main concern being to secure a sufficient supply of professional interpreter graduates. Since 2015, DG Interpretation has been chairing the Task Force on Joint Training Ventures.
The 2019 Annual Meeting was co-hosted by the two linguistic services of the European Parliament (DG LINC and DG TRAD) and the European Commission (DG SCIC and DGT), with the support of the Translation Service of the General Secretariat of the Council of the European Union and the Directorate-General for Multilingualism of the Court of Justice of the European Union (DG TRAD and CJEU-DI), in Brussels on 27-29 May 2019.
The 2020 Annual Meeting will be hosted by the United Nations Office at Nairobi.
The Brussels Statement on multilingualism, issued as an outcome of IAMLADP 2019, is available in all twenty-four official languages of the European Union (host of IAMLADP 2019) and the six official languages of the United Nations in English and French compilations.
CIUTI - Conférence Internationale Permanente d'Instituts Universitaires de Traducteurs et Interprètes
Initiated in 1960, CIUTI is the world’s oldest and most prestigious international association of university institutes with translation and interpretation programmes. Membership requires fulfillment of strict quality criteria and is a distinct seal of quality.
DG Interpretation is regularly invited to CIUTI meetings.
HINTS - Heads of Interpreting Services
HINTS is a worldwide network of Heads of Interpretation Services, created in 2006, with the aim to exchange best practices.
Members advise and help each other concerning urgent questions and keep in touch electronically.
Stakeholders are: The African Development Bank Group, ARTE, the Council of Europe, the European Institutions, Eurocontrol, the Deutsche Bundestag, the European Patent Organisation, the FAO, the German Federal Ministry of Defense, the Government of Canada Translation Bureau, the ICC, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, the ILO, the IMF, NATO, the NATO Defense College, the OECD, the Secretariat of the Pacific Community, the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, UNESCO, the United Nations, the US Department of State, the World Bank Group, the WHO, the WTO, the World Tourism Organisation and the World Meteorological Organisation.
DG Interpretation participates in HINTS in order to cooperate with language services of other international organisations in particular in the field of interpretation.
EFNIL - European Federation of National Institutions for Language
EFNIL, the European Federation of National Institutions for Language, was founded by the General Assembly of its member institutions in 2003. Its members are the institutions, present in every EU member state, whose role includes monitoring the official language or languages of their country, advising on language use, or developing language policy.
The European Federation of National Institutions for Language provides a forum for these institutions to exchange information about their work and to gather and publish information about language use and language policy within the European Union.
EFNIL is also responsible for the European Language Monitor (ELM), which aims – through its database of the results of qualitative as well as quantitative research - to present an overview of linguistic legislation and planning in Europe. In 2017 EFNIL initiated a new project called ELIPS , an acronym which refers to (the use of) European Languages and their Intelligibility in the Public Sphere, i.e. the use of European languages as instruments of communication for government, legislation and public administration.