diff --git a/t/lib-git-svn.sh b/t/lib-git-svn.sh
index b0ec12ff6c..6a50b8793e 100644
--- a/t/lib-git-svn.sh
+++ b/t/lib-git-svn.sh
@@ -186,3 +186,15 @@ start_svnserve () {
              --listen-host 127.0.0.1 &
 }
 
+prepare_a_utf8_locale () {
+	a_utf8_locale=$(locale -a | sed -n '/\.[uU][tT][fF]-*8$/{
+	p
+	q
+}')
+	if test -n "$a_utf8_locale"
+	then
+		test_set_prereq UTF8
+	else
+		say "# UTF-8 locale not available, some tests are skipped"
+	fi
+}
diff --git a/t/t9129-git-svn-i18n-commitencoding.sh b/t/t9129-git-svn-i18n-commitencoding.sh
index 39b6bcb398..8dbd6476fa 100755
--- a/t/t9129-git-svn-i18n-commitencoding.sh
+++ b/t/t9129-git-svn-i18n-commitencoding.sh
@@ -14,17 +14,7 @@ compare_git_head_with () {
 	test_cmp current "$1"
 }
 
-a_utf8_locale=$(locale -a | sed -n '/\.[uU][tT][fF]-*8$/{
-	p
-	q
-}')
-
-if test -n "$a_utf8_locale"
-then
-	test_set_prereq UTF8
-else
-	say "# UTF-8 locale not available, some tests are skipped"
-fi
+prepare_a_utf8_locale
 
 compare_svn_head_with () {
 	# extract just the log message and strip out committer info.