A change in lexicon

Gone were the soaring rhetoric and stock phrases that typically characterize public discussions of such landmark subjects. Instead, Alexandra Russell-Bitting and the other IDB translators assigned to the start of FTAA negotiations in Miami had to deal with language that had them constantly running to their technical dictionaries, and when that failed, to the delegates themselves.

"This was down and dirty, roll-up-your-sleeves, let's-get-this-show-on-the-road type work," reports Russell-Bitting.

For her and her colleagues, it meant keeping up with terminology such as "inward and outward processing," "single-desk traders," and "satellite accounting method."

The delegates arrived in taxis, not limousines. For the most part mid-level technical staff, such as directors of integration and/or trade offices and officials in areas such as customs and agriculture, they came with lists of discussion items on topics that included market access; agriculture; services; investment; subsidies, antidumping and countervailing duties; competition policy; government procurement; intellectual property rights; and dispute settlement.

These aren't the stuff of the 7 o'clock news, but of real work getting done.