Sworn Translation in Aydın

Most of the translation work that comes from Aydın begins in a field. Getting figs, olives, chestnuts and cotton onto European retail shelves takes a file of documents a good deal thicker than the produce itself. What the buyer wants is not simply the goods but proof of how they were grown. We have given this page over to the paper side of agricultural exports.

Another feature of the files that come from Aydın is that the sender is often not a large export company but a producers’ union or a medium-sized packing facility. At that scale there is no full-time foreign trade department; the documents are usually gathered by the same person who runs production. A roadmap you can follow is therefore worth as much as the translation itself.

The certification file travels ahead of the produce

In supplying European supermarket chains, the documents demanded of a producer have grown considerably over the years. Good agricultural practice certificates, organic production certificates, residue analysis reports, traceability records, packaging and label information, social compliance audit reports… Most of these are drawn up in Turkish and translated into the buyer’s language; some arrive from a foreign audit body and are rendered into Turkish.

The point to watch in analysis reports is the numerical values and the units. Carrying the decimal separator of a residue value across incorrectly can set off a chain of events that ends with the produce being rejected. In reports of this kind we run a separate numerical check, independent of the translation of the text.

Document	Who asks for it	Direction
Organic production certificate	Importer / retailer	Turkish into English
Residue and analysis report	Buyer’s quality unit	Turkish into English and German
Audit report	Foreign certification body	English into Turkish
Supply contract	Buyer company	Both directions
Label and packaging text	Legislation of the target market	Turkish into German and Dutch
Geographical indication registration file	Producers’ union	Turkish into English
Residence permit and title deed papers	Foreign residents on the coast	Dutch, German

Why Dutch is on this list

The Dutch in Aydın’s language profile is the product of two separate realities. The first is the role the Netherlands plays as a distribution hub in the European trade in agricultural produce; once goods enter there, expectations about labels and documents take shape around that language. The second is the residence permits, title deeds and health formalities of Dutch and Belgian pensioners settled in the province’s coastal districts. German generates both commercial and personal demand in much the same way. The full list of languages is on the languages page.

The harvest calendar sets the translation calendar

In agricultural exports the documents travel with the produce, and the harvest window is narrow. An analysis report still awaiting translation while a consignment stands ready turns straight into storage costs. That is why we give exporters in Aydın the same advice every time: have the recurring document templates prepared before the season starts. A report in which only the date and the batch number change does not need translating from scratch each time.

Geographical indications and the account of origin

Aydın’s figs and olives, unlike ordinary agricultural produce, are sold on their geographical identity. Protecting that identity abroad calls for a set of documents of its own: registration certificates, product specification files, descriptions of the production method and audit reports. In these texts, the geography in which the product is grown and the method by which it is produced are defined in terms that carry legal consequences.

The rule in translation here is that geographical names and registered product names are preserved. A registered product name is not translated; an explanation may be given in the target language, but the name itself stays as it is. Translating the name in effect does away with the protection registration confers.

In descriptions of the production method, it is the local terms that cause trouble. The regional terms used at the drying, sorting and packing stages have no direct equivalent in most languages. In that case, keeping the term and explaining it is a safer course than forcing an invented equivalent; it is also what registration files expect.

Send it from the village, get it back from Ankara

We have no branch in Aydın. But because the buyer accepts a digital copy for the great majority of export documents, the whole procedure runs online. Where a wet-signed copy is needed, it reaches the address by courier. Photographing the document out in the growing area and uploading it is enough for you to see the price and the delivery date.

The information here is for general guidance; in a process that runs remotely, the original document may still be required. Confirm the details with the institution to which you will submit the papers.