Languages constitute the vehicle of information, in particular of economic information. The creation of a single European market demands that all partners participating in economic activities have access to information placed at their disposal in languages other than their own, and that conversely they can communicate information to others not speaking their own language. This is the problem of the transfer of information between languages, in other words of translation.

More precisely, the negative economic impact of multilingualism is twofold for European economic participants:

in their role as producers of goods and services, they confront additional obstacles when they wish to export, and these translate into a loss of time and money and consequently a reduced competitiveness.

in their role as consumers of goods and services, they experience difficulties in informing themselves on the most recent technical developments and in procuring the most modern equipment, resulting in a technological backwardness and so again a reduced competitiveness.

On the other hand, the very fact of being the sole major economic and industrial bloc in the word requiring to find a solution to such problems can also give Europe a considerable economic advantage. Europe has here a unique opportunity to acquire a valuable know-how in the field of language processing, which it can use to advantage both in the commercial field (directly through selling its experience and implementations; indirectly in more easily surmounting other linguistic barriers in its relations with external economic partners: USSR, China, Arab world, Latin America, etc.), and in the social field (through applying its products to the integration of the handicapped, etc.), in the framework of monolingual activities just as much as multilingual activities.

In the longer term the development of healthy and profitable language industries will assure for Europe a worldwide supremacy.