Hualien County Government holds "Training Courses for Interpreters" to help new immigrants make use of their language advantages

To help new immigrants and migrant workers to communicate without barriers, the Hualien County Government has specially organized "training courses for interpreters" to make use of the language advantages of new immigrants. Currently, there are language interpreters in 6 languages including Vietnam, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar, and English. Let Hualien become a friendly city with no language barriers. In addition, new immigrants come to Taiwan for work, marriage, and other reasons, and often have problems due to environmental, cultural, and language differences. Therefore, the Hualien County Government (花蓮縣府) and the New Immigrant Family Service Center (新住民家庭服務中心) have increased the interpreter talent database, expanded interpretation resources, and provided public and private departments’ interpretation and matchmaking services in the county.

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The Hualien New Immigrants Center conducts training courses for interpreters every year. Photo/Provided by Hualien New Immigrants’ Center

Chen Chia-Fu (陳加富), Director of Social Affairs Department of the Hualien County Government (花蓮縣府社會處), said that through the trainees of the "Interpreters Training Course" (通譯人員培訓課程), Nguyen from Vietnam and Ajuan from Indonesia were helped to integrate into local life. Although the two had married and immigrated to Taiwan for many years already, they were too busy with their work and did not have the opportunity to learn Chinese. They always use their mother language when they communicate with sisters from the same hometown and with their family members. When the epidemic became severe, the language interpreters assisted them with the multilingual versions of the epidemic information which allowed them to pay more attention to their own and their family members’ health.

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The new immigrants make use of their language advantages and serve as interpreters for their hometown sisters. Photo/Provided by TPG Gallery

In addition, language is an important life tool. Every year, the Hualien County New Immigrants Center (花蓮縣新住民中心) trains bilingual new immigrants to become interpreters. For public and private units who provide services for new immigrants and who need language assistance, please contact the New Immigrants Family Service Center by using the resources of the interpretation service platform. Everyone can work together to create an inclusive and friendly living environment.