Foreign languages essential for EU firms

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According to an EU-study, 11% of small businesses have lost an export contract and miss out on revenues because of a lack of foreign language skills. This loss amounts to an average of ?325,000 each year over a three year period.

"Far from being an unwelcome cost to doing business, investing in language skills can dramatically improve a company's business opportunities", said Leonard Orban, EU mulitlingualism commissioner. He therefore plans "to place multilingualism at the heart of the Lisbon strategy for more growth and jobs."

European businesses should no longer rely on their employers' school education when it comes to the knowledge of foreign languages but rather inverst in language training themselves. Since there exists a clear link betwenn languages and export success, the sudy proposes several measures, such as having a language strategy, appointing native speakers, recruiting staff with language skills and using translators or interpreters. An SME investing in these four policies was calculated to achieve an export sale proportion 44.5 percent higher than one without these investments.

The study also shows that English remains the key language for gaining access to export markets, although in large companies expanding beyond Europe's borders Spanish, Russian, Arabic and Mandarin are on the rise.

Source: Businessweek.com