At K International, we make special efforts to align our products and services with food and drink international markets. Our compliance, labelling and translation services have helped many start-up, growth and established brands tackle some difficult and challenging issues on the import and export of food and drink products.

We realise the opportunities afforded by diversity of products can go stalemate if the correct compliance procedures are not adhered to. The complexity of Brexit and more stringent controls on the labelling, composition and classification has some added frustration for producers and traders.

Don’t let that be a barrier to market entry, as K International have tackled the most complex issues and helped innovators in the food and drink retail reach international markets, thereby stimulating demand and sales.

As the International Food and Drink Show official translation partners, our expert consultants will be on hand to talk through the robust processes we offer to make your presence in international markets trouble free. Our ISO 9001 certification ensures the quality of our services to you and we have initiated successful launches of a diverse product range globally.

See us on stand 2891n for a friendly chat and a free discovery scoping path for your food and drink project. Our compliance expert will give you free advice in our K-Compliance Advice Hub.

To book a call or email to book a show appointment here: K-Compliance Advice Hub

Please visit our website for further information

Book your free tickets here

The post Power Your Global Presence with K International’s Services for Food & Drink Markets appeared first on K International.

If you’re considering collaborating with us on an upcoming project then you might be interested to know more about the projects we’ve successfully worked on in the past. Following our successful work with a number of other leading UK retailers, Marks & Spencer approached us to assist them with their translation requirements. After experiencing issues in the past, they were keen to ensure the highest quality translations were put in place for their upcoming projects.

Marks and Spencer is a household name in the UK and a leading British multinational retailer specialising in the home, clothing and food sectors. They operate 700+ stores in the United Kingdom and have over 360 stores overseas.

They initially required our services specifically in relation to their food labelling department, ensuring accurate translations were used in ingredients lists and other legal requirements, often with a 24-hour turn around. On a regular day, we handle around 50 translations from all the different product ranges on offer. These are sent to us by an international food regulation and labelling company, also working in partnership with M&S. The translators are expected to work on the files using extensive guidelines supplied to us by the client and query anything they are unsure of to a team of legal experts at the labelling company. They will then check all our translations before they are implemented into the final artwork. In order to help find the best solution to any translation-related issues, we share with them a tracker which is sent daily to the translators and encourages them to provide feedback from a linguistic point of view.

To make sure we meet and exceed our client’s expectations, we have put a dedicated team of experienced project managers in place to work with M&S at every stage of the translation process. Project managers’ duties involve preparing files for translation and assigning them to translators, dealing with queries from translators, passing on information from the food regulators and ensuring deadlines are met. In addition to this, our onsite account manager liaises with members of the international team at M&S headquarters in London. This close integration has provided a greater degree of flexibility in our project workflow, we are now able to adapt to and undertake projects outside of our original remit of food labelling whenever M&S require it.

One such project provided us with the opportunity to translate three staff leadership training modules into French. This involved a two stage process that necessitated an artwork element as well as standard text translation.

First, we employed our specialist software tool, memoQ, to handle the text based portion of the project. This allowed us to efficiently manage the translation with a 24 hour turn around as required by the client. memoQ synchronises projects with our dedicated bespoke M&S language memory, this enables us to automatically translate any segments of text that have previously been translated and used in older client projects.

As we have a specialist team of translators in place who work on food labelling for M&S, we had key people with experience of the brand and their requirements. This allowed us to integrate this new project into our existing client workflow. As the nature of this project differed substantially from the normal requirements it required a slightly different approach, by specifically targeting a translator and proof reader within the existing team who also had experience of copywriting, we could ensure the best possible outcome. Our multilingual project managers are also able to address translator queries directly, discussing aspects of the project at every stage to improve the final outcome and increase overall efficiency.

Once the text translation had been approved, the project was passed to our in-house design studio who implemented the new language into the documents. Due to the increase in length of the translation compared to the source, the design had to be adjusted to accommodate this, whilst still holding true to the original concept. In certain circumstances the new text would not fit, in this case the translator and project manager used their expertise to rework the translation into a more concise format that would fit the design. This allowed us to deliver a high quality set of documents to the client that had taken into account the target market, the original message and the design in a very short timeframe.

If you’d like to know more about other projects we’ve worked on then take a look at some of the case studies HERE

Want to chat about an upcoming project and how we can help you achieve it? Email us at info@k-international.com

The post Working with Marks & Spencer appeared first on K International.

The full Export Strategy contains the following 12 steps to getting the UK to £1tn of exports a year:

1. Boost the Export Support Service – a new single point of contact for exporters to Europe which has been funded with £45m
2. New DIT offices in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and a second DIT HQ in Darlington, will offer support across the UK
3. An Internationalisation Fund for SMEs in England will aim to grow international sales, and has £4 million of support to attend trade fairs
4. Export credit agency UK Export Finance to expand its products and delivery network, making it easier for exporters to secure business overseas
5. The government will focus on strengthening a joint approach, connecting governments and business through its global networks
6. The UK Export Academy will expand to teach SMEs in all parts of the UK how to navigate the technicalities of exporting
7. ‘Export Champions’ will help businesses learn from exporting successes through networking and peer-to-peer learning
8. The ‘Made in the UK, Sold to the World’ campaign will champion the UK’s priority sectors
9. A “bigger and better” UK Tradeshow Programme will be targeted to help SMEs exhibit at the world’s biggest tradeshows
10. Exporting will be “at the heart of reforms to regulations, cross-government measures and regulatory diplomacy” to help exporting thrive
11. International teams in more than 180 global markets will provide sector and market specific support
12. New markets will be opened for export with new trade deals aiming to cover 80% of UK trade by the end of 2022, and broader work to remove market access barriers.

The regulatory environment for products and services is increasingly complex and differs from country to country – Ensuring that labelling complies with local legislation avoids wastage, loss and delay. 

With our holistic approach to multilingual pack copy management, we guide and navigate customers through the maze of regulations, so that their labeling complies from the outset. We combine extensive language capabilities with proven project management skills when handling complex needs.

Our specialists provide:

• Accurate information on the local laws in the target market.
• Compliant labelling advice for general merchandise and food products, and allergen information.
• Artwork design, validation or redesign so that symbols and claims on packaging are compliant.
• Market intelligence concerning legal constraints and implications for different products.

Why not explore our services for translation, compliance and artwork for businesses who wish to export and import where these services are vital to your business.

Email: info@k-international.com
Tel: 01908 557900
Contact Us Form

K International – Your One-Stop Translation and Creative Marketing Agency

With a Love of Languages…

… and a contagious passion to make your project a success.

We take the time to understand your company and the challenges you face, collaborating to offer the best possible solution for your needs.

The post Made in the UK – Time to Step Up Your International Footprint appeared first on K International.

You should consider now how you are going to submit your customs declarations and pay any duties that are due. You can appoint an intermediary, such as a customs agent, to deal with your declarations on your behalf or you can submit them yourself. It is important to act now to ensure business continuity and in this blog we examine the changes in the import and export origin of goods.

Rules of origin – for imports and exports

The UK’s deal with the EU, called the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA), means that the goods you import or export may benefit from a reduced rate of Customs Duty (tariff preference). To use this, you need proof that the goods you:

• import from the EU that they originate there
• export to the EU that they originate in the UK

By ‘originate’ we mean where goods (or the materials, parts or ingredients used to make them) have been produced or manufactured. It is not where the goods have been shipped or bought from. Your goods will need to meet the product specific rules of origin requirements set out in the TCA.

UK and EU importers can claim tariff preference if they have one of the following proofs of origin:

• a statement on origin – this must be made out by the exporter to confirm that the product originates in the UK or EU
• the importer’s knowledge – this option allows the importer to claim tariff preference based on their own knowledge of where the goods they’re importing originate from

If you export goods to the EU and you provide the EU importer with a statement on origin, you may also need to have a supplier declaration in place. These are needed to confirm the origin of the goods you’re exporting when the manufacture alone is not enough to meet the product-specific rules of origin.

If you cannot provide a supplier declaration to confirm the UK origin of goods you exported to the EU between 1 January and 31 December 2021, you must let your customer know.

If you’re subject to a request for verification by EU customs authorities and you can’t provide this supporting evidence, your EU customer will be liable to pay the full (non-preferential) rate of Customs Duty and you may get a penalty charge.

We recently asked if you are ready for the changes, please leave your answers as we’d like to share this with the business community please vote here https://bit.ly/3rI7oET

Did You Know K International Provide Labelling Solutions Designed for International Retailers & Wholesalers?

Producing fully translated labels, over-stickers and packaging that meet local market regulatory requirements and localised consumer preferences.

A team of specialist retail translators and transcreators work closely with local regulatory advisors to create translated copy. Using our international workflow platform, which can be aligned and integrated with your own labelling schedule, labels can be produced quickly in 250 languages.

Email: info@k-international.com
Tel: 01908 557900
Contact Us Form

The post New Rules for Exporters and Importers – Are You Ready? appeared first on K International.

We’ve identified seven key areas to focus on when planning your project.

1. What is The Purpose of the Project?

The purpose of the translation may be to meet regulatory requirements e.g. food labeling to meet Brexit requirements or could be specific industry terminology like medical to inform the medical community that uses specialist vocabulary. The process is not as simple as swapping one word for its’ immediate translation but considering the target audience and the culture to achieve meaning and impact.

2. Detail the Project Requirements

The first step is to scope the project requirements and the key question to answer at this stage is what type of content is being translated; is it a manual, video, app, website, or book?

Due to technology needs, you may have digital and non-digital formats that need some redesign or reformat to target your destination. You also may need to look at future-proofing because if you have a physical manual for example but that may need to go online and be in a digital format at a later date.

The scope is important as the scale of the task might be bigger than first envisaged and may increase costs. You may need to do a phased implementation to manage chunks of the project and have several release increments to do market testing before refining and having a final release.

3. Create a Project Timeline

You may have a tight deadline in which case agile project methodology may be needed to deliver on time and with the right quality and this will also cost more as extra resources are needed. The best method, in this case, is to reduce the features to get on-time delivery without compromising quality and you can create phases to the project so that you can implement incrementally e.g. if you have several formats do the physical version before the digital version or vice versa and release the other version later.

However, the best method is always to plan ahead with the detailed project requirements so that ample time for proofreading, amends, changes in scope and formats, multiple translations etc. can be accounted for and built into the scoping, quality checks and feedback amends.

4. Project Specific Requirements

When looking at your scope consider the amount of proofreading that needs to be done, for example, a second translator may be needed to review the clarity and terminology is locally correct and in line with communication objectives. This may also require an in-house and agency collaboration so that elements such as brand messages and themes are translated correctly.

5. Special Requirements

Part of the scoping element would be to look at special requirements such as regulatory legislation and an example of this would be food labeling where the types of product, where it is being sold and number of SKUs would influence the project requirements and deliverables.

6. Formats of Translations

Special Needs: You may have translation requirements that require a special format for disability needs such as Braille, extra-large texts etc.

Transcription: This will require an appreciation of the audio length, quality of audio and formats.

Multilingual Voice-Overs: This impacts how your project will look like as you will need to consider the style of the voice-over and the language it is being delivered in.

Interpreting: When using an interpreter, it is important to take into account location, length of time, certifications, and experience for your project.

Transcreation: This involves creating marketing assets from conception from advertising to slogans so they meet brand objectives. You want to evoke the same emotion cross-culturally with impact.

7. Consultancy

You may have the need for a consultant to help you prepare, implement and project manage your translation requirements. This can be very useful if you use an expert to manage first-time and complex projects that require the complexity and scope to be identified fully before embarking ongoing into translation services. The consultant can also help manage the project to completion.

These are 7 key areas to consider when planning your language translation needs as setting your objectives, detailing and managing deadlines, feedback and delivery can be complex.

The post 7 Elements to Consider for Your Language Translation Project appeared first on K International.

How to decide what format to use for your research interview transcription.

The exact formatting can vary depending on who’s using your data and what they’re using it for. However, there are some general guidelines that are widely used by researchers in almost all fields.

First, you need to decide what format to use. There are three main formats: verbatim, semi-verbatim, and intelligent verbatim. Unsure which to choose? Here’s a quick rundown:

Verbatim: Verbatim transcription records everything on the audio file, including non-verbal noises, chairs creaking, throats clearing…you get the picture. It’s the most detailed and precise format for transcription.

Semi-Verbatim: In some cases, the non-verbal information included in a verbatim transcription can be distracting, rather than enlightening. In these cases, a semi-verbatim transcription will remove extraneous noises and interjections from the interview.

Intelligent Verbatim: As the name suggests, “intelligent verbatim” is the most polished way to format a research interview transcription. Even the most eloquent speakers don’t always talk in complete sentences. In an intelligent verbatim transcription, the transcript is polished to remove grammatical errors and tie sentences together. It takes a skilled transcriber to ensure that the resulting transcription remains an accurate reflection of the interview.

For more on the different types of transcription, see Transcription of Qualitative Data.

How to Identify Speakers in a Research Interview Transcription

It is important to identify speakers in a research interview transcription. This allows readers to follow the dialogue and prevents confusion about who is speaking at what time.

But how will you identify them? The answer depends on how much identifying information you want to include. If you’re including the names of the participants, you have the option to identify them by their first names or by initials.

However, in many cases, you’ll want to anonymise the data. According to EDUCAUSE, a non-profit specialising in IT for higher education,  Information “De-identification ” or “anonymisation” refer to “situations where personally identifying information is removed from data sets in order to protect a person’s individual privacy.”

Depending on the research specifications, that can mean removing everything from the speakers’ name to other identifying information like places, job description or even gender.

But in that case, how can you tell who’s speaking? Here are some possible ideas for identifying speakers within a transcription:

• SPEAKER 1, SPEAKER 2, etc
• Roman numerals, like I or IV.
• INTERVIEWEE
• Pseudonyms
• By gender, i.e. MALE 1, FEMALE 2. This can help make conversations easier to track without using names, but it also reduces the amount of privacy available to participants. Additionally, provisions should be made to ensure nonbinary individuals’ identities are both respected and kept safe.

When other identifying information (places, employers, etc) needs to be hidden, indicate that on the transcript with [de-identified].

Formatting Conventions for Research Interview Transcripts

Whether you’re transcribing an interview, focus group, or observation, the following tips will help make your transcriptions more user-friendly.

• Speaker names or pseudonyms should be in all capital letters.
• Use ellipses to indicate when information has been omitted.
• For words that are unclear, put the word in brackets with a question mark after it. For example: [what?]
• It’s also good practice to leave time-stamps on longer transcripts.
• The most commonly used fonts are Calibri and Times New Roman. Avoid Common Sans like the plague.
• For structured interviews, where the same questions are repeated with different participants, use Q1, Q2, etc on a consistent basis throughout the transcription.

Free Research Interview Transcription Templates

As a bonus, here are four FREE templates to help you get started. Simply click the link to download.

Verbatim Template

For when you need every “um” and “ah”.

Semi Verbatim Template

A cleaner template that still offers a detailed record of the conversation.

Semi Verbatim Template with timestamps at speaker intervals

Including timestamps in your transcriptions makes it easier to find and reference specific quotes.

Intelligent Verbatim Template

Complete sentences and cleaned-up grammar.

How To Format Your Research Interview Transcripts The Easy Way

Research interviews are a great way to collect rich data on people’s experiences and opinions. Proper formatting of research interview transcripts is an essential first step to making this qualitative data more accessible and easier to work with. Following the relevant guidelines is also an essential part of sharing your research with the world, making it more likely to be accepted for publication.

Of course, transcription, in general, can be time-consuming. But you don’t have to do it yourself. By partnering with a reliable transcription service like K International, you can focus on your work and let us handle the nitty-gritty details of transcription and formatting. We have decades of experience supporting universities, schools and individual researchers with their academic transcription requirements.

For more information about our academic transcription services, contact us today!

The post How To Format Your Research Interview Transcripts (with FREE Templates) appeared first on K International.

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Use the European Association of Science Editors translation tips for scholars.

According to the European Association of Science Editors (EASE):

“To make international scientific communication more efficient, research articles and other scientific publications should be COMPLETE, CONCISE, and CLEAR.”

We couldn’t agree more! These guidelines are not limited to the hard sciences- they apply to other disciplines as well!

The more clear and precise the language used in the original document is, the easier it will be for your translator to deliver an accurate translation.

Here’s why: Many people think that translation is a simple matter of substituting one word for another. It’s usually more complicated than that. Your translator needs to be able to understand the ideas you’re communicating so that they can decide the best way to communicate them in the target language.

If your document is unclear, the translation might not be accurate. Some linguistic choices can also make it harder to translate your text accurately. For example, figures of speech, idioms and puns often don’t translate precisely into another language.

Proper structure and formatting also assist readers of all types (including translators) to accurately understand your work.

Send your translator a complete final draft to work with.

Remember, translation is already a complex task. Even if you’re working on a deadline, it’s best to wait until your article is finalised before sending it to be translated. Having to incorporate changes in multiple languages increases the risk that something will be overlooked during the publication process.

Look for translators who are familiar with your field of study.

Different academic fields use different terminology. And they often use words differently than they are used in everyday writing and speech. A translator who’s familiar with the terminology in your area of study will be better equipped to choose equivalent words or phrases in the target language.

Provide an accurate, detailed translation brief.

“Translation brief” is simply the set of instructions you provide with your translation request. Make sure your brief is accurate and detailed. If you’re not sure if you’ve given enough information, don’t be afraid to ask your translation partner.

Provide glossaries and other resources for common terms in your field.

To reduce the chance of misunderstandings, it helps to provide a list of the key terms and ideas that need to be conveyed. Glossaries and other terminology resources reduce ambiguity during the translation process. This will help your translator get your research article’s meaning across more clearly and accurately in the target language.

Clarify your target audience.

Are you writing for a specialist or non-specialist readership? Communication is a two-way street. Your translator or language services provider must know not only what you’re trying to say, but who you’re trying to say it to.

Consider, for example, how often scientific research gets misinterpreted in mainstream publications even when everyone shares a language and a culture!

Don’t overlook images.

If your article contains images, especially complex images like charts or graphs, these also require translation. Here again, the process is rarely as straightforward as it seems at first glance.

That’s because different languages use different amounts of text to say the same thing. So your images may need to be reformatted or redesigned for clarity’s sake. Additionally, if your native language is read from left to right but your target language is right-to-left, that also needs to be taken into account!

With that in mind, make sure you send images along with the text in an editable format. Using a translator or LSP who is familiar with design and desktop publishing is also advisable.

Ask about the quality assurance process.

Quality assurance is the key to ensuring an accurate final product.

In translation, the quality assurance process is very similar to what happens in publishing. This often includes a proofreading and editing stage where your translation will be reviewed by another person or set of eyes before being passed on to you for approval.

This gives both parties a chance to highlight any areas that might need further clarification before publication.

Our number one translation tip for scholars: Choose a trusted translation partner.

Here’s your best bet to ensure accuracy: Work with a language services provider with a strong track record in translating academic research.

Not only will they be able to match you with a linguist with the right background for your project, but they also have quality control procedures in place to catch errors before publication.

At K International, our team is here to help translate your research accurately into over 250 languages. Our team is experienced in translating research from a variety of fields and disciplines, including clinical trials, medical journals, pharmaceutical research and so much more. For details, contact us! 

The post How To Ensure Your Research Article Is Accurately Translated: 9 Translation Tips for Scholars appeared first on K International.

Time Spent Vs. Cost Efficiency

The first thing to consider is time. If you choose to handle the transcription yourself, there’s a significant time investment involved. Expect to spend 3 hours or more for each hour of audio content you need to transcribe.

Some researchers feel that the time spent transcribing is worth it, that it gives them a greater insight into their data. Others feel their time would be better spent on other tasks.  In that case, outsourcing to a professional or to an app makes more sense.

The bottom line is this: Transcription is a skill. Sometimes, it’s simply more efficient to delegate time-consuming or difficult tasks to skilled professionals.

Accuracy and Avoiding Transcription Errors When Transcribing Research Interviews

You’re no doubt familiar with the saying, “Garbage in, garbage out.” If your interview data isn’t recorded accurately, your conclusions may not be accurate either.

So, obviously, accuracy is important. But when it comes to research interviews, what does “accuracy” mean? Does it mean including every hem and haw, every “ummm”, every grammatical error? Or is it better to “clean up” the transcription, removing vocal tics and extra words?

How much information is too much?

Fully verbatim transcriptions preserve vital information about the interview. But, if extraverbal noises aren’t handled correctly they can paint an innacurate picture of your research subjects. For example, in research interviews with HIV+ men, described here, one interview transcript showed the interview being interrupted by the participant repeatedly sniffing.  This gave some researchers the wrong impression of the participant:

 For example, in our work with HIV-positive men, the research team read a transcript where the participant’s statement was continually interrupted by his sniffling, indicated in the transcript by ((sniff)). When the team met to discuss this transcript, the sniffling became confusing and the subject of some debate. Some thought the participant was crying during the interview, whereas others made assumptions about drug use. The confusion was settled when the interviewer explained that the participant was sick and his nose was running.

The trick is to include the right amount of information to accomplish your project goals without creating unnecessary confusion.

Ultimately, the answer depends on your research goals and on the relevant academic guidelines. Learn more about your options here. But regardless, your transcription must accurately represent the interview.

That brings us to the downside of using automated transcription apps to save time: accuracy suffers. Professional transcribers boast a 99.9% accuracy rate. With an app, expect more like 60-80% accuracy. Accents and heavy use of dialect can throw this off even more.

Language and Translation

Sometimes, the interview needs to be transcribed in a different language from the original. In this case, the best practice is to first transcribe into the source language and then translate the resulting output into the target language. This allows for easy comparisons between the original interview text and the translation. Transcribing directly into the target language can save you money, however.

Like transcription, translation is a skill that takes time and training to develop. And just as with transcription, machines can help, but only to a certain extent.

To maintain quality across languages, your safest bet is to use a professional multilingual transcription service.

Culture and Context

Research interviews are designed to capture the individual views or thought processes of interviewees. That sounds simple enough. However, when the interview needs to be translated to another language, valuable cultural context can be lost, leading to misunderstandings. For example, if an open-ended question is asked, it may be understood differently depending on cultural expectations.

Using transcription services that use human transcriptionists and/or translators to translate the interview can help you preserve all of this important information.

Transcription Metadata and Formatting

No matter what method you choose to transcribe your interviews, it’s important to be consistent about what metadata you include and how you format the resulting transcript. Examples of metadata include:

• The participants’ names or ID numbers.
• Interviewer name.
•  Date, location and time of the recording.

Being clear and consistent about this from the beginning will save you time in the long run.

Privacy and Security When Transcribing Research Interviews

Research often involves sensitive topics, such as medical histories. And interviews may include personal information that could identify participants. When this is the case, ensuring confidentiality is a must, for both ethical reasons and legal reasons.

Transcriptionists and transcription services can help with this. Completed transcripts can remove or obscure certain words, phrases, names, places etc., helping you protect the identity of your participants while still preserving all important information from the interview. Reputable transcription services should have specific technology and guidelines in place to protect your data and the confidentiality of your participants—and they’ll follow them without question.

Choosing an Academic Transcription Service to Transcribe Your Research

Selecting the right transcription partner can make or break your research. As transcription can be a laborious process, it’s important to choose the best transcription service that fits your budget and needs.

At K International, we have over 30 years of experience offering academic transcription services for professors, lecturers, students and researchers.  We can handle recordings in any medium and in any digital format. Our services are are secure, so you can ensure that sensitive research data remains confidential. And should you need multilingual transcription, our expert linguists have you covered in over 250 languages.

If you have a research or other academic project that would benefit from expert transcription services, we’d love to hear from you. Contact us to see how our team can keep your projects on track and on deadline.

The post 6 Things to Consider When Transcribing Research Interviews appeared first on K International.