Abstract:

In the last decades consumer demands in the field of food production has changed considerably. Consumers more and more believe that foods contribute directly to their health. Today foods are not intended to only satisfy hunger and to provide necessary nutrients for humans but also to prevent nutrition-related diseases and improve physical and mental well-being of the consumers. In this regard, functional foods play an outstanding role. The increasing demand on such foods can be explained by the increasing cost of healthcare, the steady increase in life expectancy, and the desire of older people for improved quality of their later years.
Because of that functional food have developed and they can be defined as food products fortified with special constituents that possess advantageous physiological effects.

The rapid development of the functional food area has given it a great economical importance worldwide and, therefore, the knowledge of the scientific language related to the functional food area is becoming of huge interest. Consequently, the area of functional foods as a new area of development in the fields of food science and nutrition is a privilege area to teach young translators and interpreters, that will become expertises in a specific issue and, surely, it will be widely useful in the near future for their professional careers.

The present study, aimed at students in the fourth year of the Bachelor degree of "Translation and Interpretation" offered by the University of Granada, fell within the subject "Scientific and Technical Translation" that consolidates the student expertise in specific areas where subjects in scientific, technical and technological translations are taught.

Therefore, the purpose of this study was to develop the translation competences of the future translators and interpreters in the area of functional foods and nutraceuticals based on real translation assignments which has provided an alternative learning and evaluation system.

To achieve this aim, seminars related with the translation assignments were carried out in Spanish by expert researchers in the field of functional food. Then, the students had to work on these real cases that let them to face real problems they can find in the real life. The learning process took place in individual and a collective format. Multilingual, multicultural and multidisciplinary groups were formed and different roles were taken by the members of the groups: translator expert A, translator expert B documentarist, terminologist, reviewer, etc. It is also important to highlight that the students always had the help of the experts which carried out the seminars.

Concerning the results obtained, it is important to remark that the revision of the translations made by the students allowed proving that:
1) the uptake of the concepts discussed in the classroom was satisfactory and
2) the translation from real commissions motivated to the students.

This research has been funded by the Teaching Innovation Project entitled "Methods of development of the translation competences in the specific area of functional foods and nutraceuticals” code 2012-51 funded by the University of Granada.