American private enterprise is often in a better position than the government foreign aid establishment and the U.S. Agency for International Development to provide assistance in manpower training programs in the developing nations. Survey of various American firms' programs in Latin America reveals a wide variety of types and topics of training programs, directed toward the effective acquisition and development of skills. Private training programs and similar governmental efforts should be viewed as complementary rather than as competitive. Although government programs may try to achieve and maintain a framework of equity and stability within which economic development will be encouraged, individual private firms can make their own efforts to "flesh out" economic development at various levels from paper plans to living reality. (A bibliography is included.) (author/mf)