In today's information society, the greatest challenge for information professionals is to accept and understand the information world and to identify their own professional roles. These roles may vary according to the needs and stages of development of different countries, for not all countries are equally aware of the importance of information, and the development of specific information services has been uneven. Although information is crucial to every country's economic development and the industrial sector badly needs information for its activities, industrialists in developing countries do not have a solid base of experience as information users, a situation which often results in an information vacuum. To cope with these gaps, information professionals must learn to understand the industrial sector and to successfully fill their necessary roles as information managers, promoters, and counselors. Despite this need for information professionals, there is a lack of adequate training programs in developing countries such as Mexico and the majority of the Latin American countries, and the emphasis in existing programs is primarily on academic, rather than professional, aspects. Increased efforts are needed by both universities and professional institutions to identify the needs of the industrial sector and to define appropriate formal education programs for information professionals. Seven references and an 18-item bibliography are included. (KM)