Vietnamese on the Way to the 21st Century
Year after year, Vietnam has had high growth rates similar to those of China. In the year 2006 the GDP increased by 7.4 percent. Foreign trade is steadily increasing and the economic opening of the sometime communist country is in full swing. After 11 years of negotiations, Vietnam became the 150th member of the WTO on 7 January 2007. This will further enhance the appeal of the Vietnamese market, even though liberalisation based on agreed transition periods will not proceed at the same speed in every sector.
The Vietnamese language which is spoken by up to 90 million people in Vietnam and neighbouring countries is becoming all the more important in the course of this growth too. Since Vietnamese is written in a Latin script, communication with the Western cultural environment is easier than in the case of the Chinese, for example. Throughout the world there are another 6 to 7 million emigrants who speak Vietnamese as their native language.
Vietnamese has been heavily influenced by the Chinese language. During the thousand years of Chinese rule (111 BC to 968), Chinese was the language of administration and instruction.
There is a range of French words in the Vietnamese attributable to the decades-long French colonial domination. Among them are ga (from gare, "railroad station"), xi-măng (from ciment, "cement"), bia (from bière, "beer") or banh (from pain, "bread"), for instance.
Transline provides you with native-speaking translators for your Vietnamese translation; they are trained in the particular field of specialisation and live in Vietnam. In this way, your translation can be optimally harmonised with reference to cultural aspects.
