MarineTraining.eu started in 2013 as one of the services of the European Marine Biological Resource Centre (EMBRC) and it is hosted at Ghent University (UGent). Since its foundation more than 200 years ago, Ghent University is a centre of excellence in academic education and research. Maritime and Marine skills were ubiquitous in the history of the University and in its current research and education curricula. Within the principles of cross-disciplinarity, transferable skills, internationalization, industry collaboration, and lifelong learning, an interdisciplinary consortium within the university has been set up in order to generate innovative results, enhance technological innovation and boost Marine science training. Consequently, that vast expertise in Marine human capacity building allowed Ghent University to coordinate and to participate in numerous European Commission funded research projects and joint programmes for the enhancement of human potential to fully integrate higher education, research and industry.

In the light of this background, the Marine Training Platform has been initiated as one of the services of the ESFRI (European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures) EMBRC project to facilitate and centralize access to Marine human capacity building opportunities in Europe.

Marine Training's main driver was the total lack of information and overview for finding Marine and Maritime Master programmes in Europe. As a result, the Marine Training Platform was born and is continuously expanding to showcase numerous programme and short course offers around the world.