The Irish language will become a full, official language of the European Union from midnight.
On January 1st, it achieves full status with all documents published by the EU being translated as Gaeilge.
This marks the end of a derogation period, which has been in place since 2007.
This limited the amount of material published through Irish by EU institutions.
Since 2015 the scope of this derogation has been reducing, as the capacity for the translation of Irish within the EU increased.
The volume of Irish language translations has risen almost six-fold since 2016 - from 8,000 to almost 46,000 by October 2021.
While around 200 Irish language staff are now working within the EU.
Minister for European Affairs Thomas Byrne says: "The ending of derogation will make the services of the EU more accessible for Irish speakers at home and abroad.
"As a proud Gaeilgeoir myself, I regularly contribute to council meetings as Gaeilge and I would encourage everyone to make use of their cúpla focal, in every aspect of their life.
"I would also invite those with Irish language proficiency to consider a career within the EU institutions."
The EU has 24 official languages.
Irish has been a treaty language since 1973, when Ireland became a member state, meaning only EU treaties were translated into Irish.
