Danger of using ChatGPT when translating label texts

As a food supplier within Europe, you often have to deal with multilingual labels. We know from experience that Google Translate sometimes produces very clumsy translations that certainly do not meet legal requirements. But what if we use AI and let ChatGPT do our translations? Will we then get the correct legal translation?

The technology is now available and ChatGPT has access to an ever-increasing amount of information. The question of whether ChatGPT can produce legal translations is therefore certainly relevant. To put this to the test, we conducted a trial at Normec Foodcare and noticed a number of things.

The test

The source text must be completely accurate in accordance with legal terminology. Otherwise, ChatGPT will not find the legal terms and will therefore not translate them. If you mention your anti-caking agent as potato starch because you believe that this fulfils the function, this will also be translated in this way. You must be very specific in your question.

• If you only ask for a translation, you will get a literal translation. For example, acidity regulator will be translated as pH regulator.

• If you specify your request as: Please provide a translation based on legislation (EU) No. 1169/2011, you will get a better result. However, even here, the exact terms in accordance with Annex VII Part C are not yet included.

• If you specify your request as: Please provide a translation based on legislation (EU) No. 1169/2011 Annex VII Part C, you will get a better result. However, even here, the exact terms in accordance with Annex VII Part C are not provided for all desired languages.

Reliability

It therefore appears that not all information accessible to AI/ChatGPT is up to date for all languages.

In addition, you need to have thorough knowledge of the legislation yourself in order to draw up the correct source text and then ask the right questions to arrive at a legally correct translation. At present, AI/ChatGPT is not yet reliable enough and its use in food translations could lead to legally incorrect translations and, as a result, products that may have to be withdrawn from the market.

What now?

It is certainly interesting to keep an eye on developments or to develop your own tools that use AI. This will make the information increasingly accurate and, in time, AI will certainly be able to be used to produce translations.

Check

Do you need help drafting a legally correct source text, or are you working with AI yourself and would you like to have the results checked by our labelling experts? Please contact info@normeclabel.com.