The strategy of expanding the modern industrialized economic sector and the formal education system that developing countries have followed during the past twenty years has recently been questioned. In these countries, the informal economic sector is dominant and includes many more people in small business, crafts, and services. An innovative approach to informal education, education derived on the job without formal training, may be needed for the people involved in this sector. The informal sector is characterized by the smallness of the work unit and consists of workers who can be classified into four groups: entrepreneurs, establishment workers, independent workers, and casual workers. The former two groups are often somewhat educated and can benefit from formal or nonformal education, while the latter groups are often too illiterate or constrained by poverty or lack of time to make use of these educational means. For these groups, a variety of approaches to informal education may help. For instance, since most workers receive training through apprenticeships, improving the skills of the master could result in improving the education and skills of the worker. Another approach is to make technical assistance directly available to the employing establishment, e.g., sending a mobile unit. Other ways of providing training opportunity to workers in the informal sector include Vocational Improvement Centers and day release programs. Although these training approaches do not overcome all the problems associated with training in the informal sector, they are promising practices linked to needs. (KC)