The Ship Dismantling Insight by Generating Environmental and Safety Training (Ship DIGEST) project created innovate vocational education and training in order to tackle the vital issues of the low standards of health, safety and environmental awareness in the Turkish ship dismantling industry. Thanks to shipdigest currently exists a learning framework to stop the continuation of bad practices, accidents, injuries, and pollution being able to provide a positive impact within one of the big societal challenges, namely the environment and health and safety within the workplace, identified by the European Commission in its Europe 2020 Strategy.Turkey is the largest ship dismantling nation in Europe and as an industry is currently in the process of embracing the ongoing changes of implementing standards documented in the European Union’s Strategy for Better Ship Dismantling within its own processes and company policies. However, one of the main problems identified during this transitional period is the lack of knowledge and understanding of the basic health, safety and environmental competences displayed from the management level down.The Ship DIGEST project’s main objective was to assist the Turkish ship dismantling industry by providing bespoke ship dismantling vocational education and training based on innovative products, tools and knowledge from previous European projects on ship dismantling and from similar sectors within the European Union. The ship dismantling vocational education and training has been created under the European Qualifications Framework and be compatible with the European Credit system for Vocational Education and Training which will facilitate the validation, recognition and accumulation of work-related skills and knowledge, in line with policies set in the Bruges-Copenhagen process. The impact as a result of this project is that, through vocational education and training, an improvement in the health, safety and environmental competencies and an increase in the awareness of employees lead to a decrease in fatal and serious injuries and environmental incidents, a higher rate of reporting accidents and injuries and an improvement in the overall image of an industry that is renowned as being one of the most hazardous and one that attracts employees from lower social statuses. In the long term it is expected that by offering employees the chance to obtain recognised skills and qualifications, the profession of being a ship dismantling employee will become more credible within their own society due to supporting their lifelong learning and enhancing their mobility.