Interpreting at SECC: Two-Way Zoom in the Middle of an Expo

Author: Khang Nguyen

Khang Nguyen - AKT English Vietnamese Lead interpreter, 25 years in 5000 events

Interpreting at SECC, Ho Chi Minh City's largest exhibition venue, means running several seminars in parallel inside a busy trade fair. This article shares a day at VIETFISH 2026, including a two-way Zoom session with an FAO expert, what the seminar covered, where interpreting gets hard, and common questions. 

Jump to: The story · What it covered · Interpreter's choices · FAQ

Interpreting for VASEP and FAO at VIETFISH 2026

One afternoon at SECC, two rooms, two very different challenges. In one, an FAO expert was presenting remotely via Zoom. In the other, international buyers were getting ready for B2B meetings with Vietnamese shrimp and pangasius producers. I couldn't sit in both booths, so the most important decision of the day wasn't how to interpret. It was who goes where.

At VIETFISH, I emceed the morning opening ceremony, then interpreted the VASEP–SIPPO Vietnam Seafood Outlook with Phat. Seminar 1, organised by VASEP and Nha Trang University with technical support from FAO, went to Nhan and Suong. It was the technically harder room: a two-way Zoom session, where delegates asked questions in Vietnamese, the remote speaker heard them in English, and her answers came back to the room's headsets in Vietnamese.

The interpreting was in safe hands. What I watched was the thing nobody sees: the internet. At an exhibition centre, with an entire expo on the same network, the connection was genuinely unstable that day, and in a two-way session, one dropped second means a question never reaches the speaker.

So for any Zoom session at an exhibition venue, we now start with the network, not the slides: which rooms have good signal, whether the Zoom laptop has a wired line, and a 4G backup hotspot we can even lend the organiser. The seminar ran smoothly.

How do you protect remote sessions at large venues? If you have one coming up, talk to AKT Translation early.

What the Seminar Covered and Where Interpreting Gets Hard

According to VASEP, VIETFISH 2026 at SECC covered more than 14,000 m² with 335 exhibitors and 568 booths from 17 countries and territories, welcoming nearly 15,000 visitors; the opening ceremony was attended by representatives of the HCMC People's Committee, the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment and the Ministry of Industry and Trade. Trade fairs are the E in MICE, so interpreting here spans the opening ceremony, seminars and B2B meetings. Seminar 1, organised by VASEP and Nha Trang University, moved from global seafood market trends and new supply-chain requirements, to seafood fraud presented by an FAO expert via Zoom, then to adding value to by-products and green transformation with ABB Vietnam.

In AKT Translation's experience, the challenge at SECC is many rooms at once: each room needs its own booth and receivers, adjacent rooms must run on separate channels, schedules shift at the last minute, and trade fair visitors come and go, so the emcee must repeat channel instructions. Inside the room, trade, standards and processing terminology change with every speaker. If your event is also at SECC with parallel rooms, AKT Translation can support you from the planning stage.

The Interpreter's Choices: Two Terms That Are Easy to Get Wrong

• Seafood fraud → "gian lận thực phẩm thủy sản" (fraud in a trade and quality sense), not "lừa đảo", which implies a criminal scam and makes the speaker sound harsher than intended.
• By-products → "phụ phẩm" (valuable by-product), not "phế phẩm" (waste). Calling heads, skin and bones "waste" erases the circular-economy message of the presentation.

AKT Translation in the Seafood Sector

Beyond VIETFISH, AKT Translation interprets standards-focused seafood events such as an ASC (Aquaculture Stewardship Council) regulatory update seminar with VASEP in Can Tho, where certification, traceability and export terminology is as dense as any seminar room at SECC.

For Event Organisers and International Delegations

Trade fairs like VIETFISH bring foreign buyer delegations, often organised by an event organiser, PCO or DMC rather than the exhibitors themselves. These partners need one interpreting team that can cover the opening ceremony, parallel seminar rooms and B2B tables in the same day, and fit into their run-of-show without extra coordination. AKT Translation works behind the organiser: one coordinator, a room-by-room interpreter plan, technical checks with the venue AV team, and client-facing communication under the organiser's brand. The same model supports MICE interpreting in Vietnam, from incentive trips to corporate conferences.

Trade Fair Interpreting FAQs

1. How much does trade fair interpreting cost?

Cost depends on the mode (simultaneous, consecutive or booth support), hours, days, number of parallel rooms, subject complexity, and whether booths, headsets or a Zoom link are needed. Simultaneous interpretation usually requires two interpreters per room. Send your agenda, room count and duration to AKT Translation for a tailored quote.

2. Simultaneous or consecutive interpreting at a trade fair?

Seminars with many presentations, large audiences and tight schedules need simultaneous interpretation to stay on time. Consecutive interpretation suits B2B meetings, booth visits and small group discussions, where both sides speak back and forth without equipment.

3. How do you prepare for a remote Zoom speaker?

Share the remote speaker's slides in advance, agree who holds host rights, have the speaker join 30 minutes early for a two-way audio test, set up a screen showing both slides and speaker, and assign one organiser to message the speaker directly for time cues.

3. How many interpreters does a seminar room need?

For simultaneous interpretation, each room usually needs two interpreters rotating every 20–30 minutes to stay accurate. A short consecutive meeting may need only one. With several parallel rooms, a coordinator helps handle schedule changes.

Planning a seminar at SECC or a trade fair with remote speakers?

AKT Translation

✓ Advice on simultaneous, consecutive and two-way Zoom interpretation

✓ Coordinated interpreting teams for parallel seminar rooms

✓ Experienced interpreters in seafood, export and MICE events

Get a quote: +84 888 170 069 | Email: info@phiendichvien.com

AKT – Calm voices. Successful events.

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Read this article in Vietnamese