As the year 2025 draws to a close, we at the Centre for Language Technology look back at a year where Faroese language technology has truly taken center stage - internationally, professionally, and politically.
Faroese Represented on the Global Stage
The year began with significant international participation. In February, the Centre for Language Technology vitjaði Máltøknidepilin høvuðssætið hjá UNESCO in Paris for the LT4ALL conference. There, Barbara Scalvini, Iben Nyholm Debess, and Dávid í Lág were invited to present their work on Faroese language technology to more than 400 participants from across the globe. A key conclusion from the conference was that language technology development must be driven by local needs, which is a philosophy that we actively pursue in our work.
In March, these same three researchers attended the NoDaLiDa/Baltic-HLT 2025 conference (Nordic Conference on Computational Linguistics/Baltic Conference on Human Language Technology) in Tallinn, Estonia. The conference proved highly rewarding, providing opportunities to present original research and learn about exciting developments in neighboring countries. Five papers regarding the Faroese language were presented, which is a relatively high number. Interested readers can find the papers here:
Prompt Engineering Enhances Faroese MT, but Only Humans Can Tell
What’s Wrong With This Translation? Simplifying Error Annotation For Crowd Evaluation
FoQA: A Faroese Question-Answering Dataset
Mapping Faroese in the Multilingual Representation Space: Insights for ASR Model Optimization
Support in the Millions and Linguistic Democracy
One of the major highlights of the year has been the funding of new projects. The Research Council Faroe Islands has granted support for a new machine translation project aimed at developing translation between Faroese and English. An exciting component of this project is the upcoming crowdsourcing platform, where Faroese speakers can personally correct and improve translations. This is linguistic democracy in action, where we all contribute to ensuring the quality of Faroese AI. The platform will be launched in the near future.
Late in the year, we received the wonderful news that NordForsk has granted approximately 2.2 million DKK to the CAALLM project, a Nordic-Baltic collaboration on the responsible use of AI. Barbara Scalvini and Iben Nyholm Debess are participating in this project alongside leading researchers from across the Nordic and Baltic regions. The goal is to adapt Large Language Models (LLMs) to better encompass the linguistic and cultural diversity of our region. Through this project, we will create open datasets to evaluate and align models so they reflect our societal values such as equality, democracy, and trust, as well as our unique linguistic characteristics.
Political Anchoring and Funding
What may ultimately stand as the most decisive factor for the future is the political anchoring of the field. On July 8, 2025, the Prime Minister announced that Artificial Intelligence (AI) has formally become a policy area under the Ministry of Finance. This is a clear recognition that AI is no longer just for researchers, but a vital part of the Faroese public sector. We have long advocated for progress in this area and are very pleased with this development.
In the wake of this, preparatory work began in October for a comprehensive master plan for AI in the Faroe Islands. This plan will set the course for technology, data protection, and ethics, much like the "Digital Faroe Islands" (Talgildu Føroyar) initiative did in 2015.
Political will is also reflected in concrete funding. As a gesture of support, the annual appropriation for the Centre for Language Technology has been increased in the 2026 state budget. This increase is crucial for our operations, as it provides us with the stability and momentum to develop sustainable, long-term solutions for the Faroese language.
Linguistic Sovereignty is the Goal
On Mother Tongue Day 2025, the emphasis was placed on linguistic sovereignty. It is positive that tech giants like Google are opening their eyes to Faroese, as is evident with the introduction of Faroese subtitles on YouTube earlier this year, but we must own and control the core of our own language technology ourselves.
With all the activities and projects currently underway at the Centre for Language Technology, it is clear that we at the University of the Faroe Islands are working hard to fulfill this task to the best of our ability.
Now, we will pick up the pace and get to work. We expect 2026 to offer even more concrete collaborations with institutions and companies, ensuring that the Faroese language does not just keep up, but leads the way in the digital evolution.
