International Technical Communication in Linguistically Low-Resource Industries: Needs and Challenges of Spanish Wine and Olive Oil Professionals

Background:Technical and professional communication (TPC) poses a challenge to international professionals (IPs) who are not L1 English speakers or professional communicators.Literature review:There are numerous linguistically low-resource industries which represent high economic and cultural value domestically and internationally. Such is the case of the wine and olive oil sectors in Spain, which have a significant global projection, though their communication in English is often labeled as deficient.Research questions:This study explores the needs, attitudes, and challenges faced by IPs of these fields in Spain. The aim is to be able to develop appropriate actions and tools that help improve the communicative process in this and other linguistically low-resource technical communication scenarios.Research methodology:To define the dynamics in which low-resource L2 English professionals participate, we carried out a demographic study. Specifically, a national survey was conducted focusing on the writing of tasting notes as domain-specific texts produced by Spanish L2 English professionals of the fields.Results:The results show that IPs use language service providers when they can afford it. Otherwise, they employ mainly Machine Translation, risking textual quality and communicative success. Nevertheless, participants show awareness of the relevance of participating in international communication using adequate linguistic means.Conclusion:We conclude that IPs from linguistically low-resource domains strive to find means to engage in international TPC but cannot find adequate tools for it. Institutional and research efforts need to materialize for all segments of society to benefit from language policy and technological advancements.