Summary
Contracting governments to the International Convention for the Regulation of Whaling are required to provide an annual National Progress Report summarising cetacean related activities annually. National Progress Reports are intended to provide a concise summary of the cetacean research undertaken in member countries as well as a summary of information on direct and incidental anthropogenic mortality. National Progress Report data is currently submitted into an online submission system by various researchers, stakeholders and government representatives. Following submission, all data is made available for statistical query during Scientific Committee meetings however there is no associated report output that summarises data at the country or continental level. In order to increase the accessibility and visibility of National Progress Report data and encourage increased reporting from member nations, we developed an script in R that generates nation reports that summarise multiple years of submitted data by way of graphical representation and data summary tables. We present two examples of National Progress Report member nation summaries here. Additionally, we make recommendations regarding the online submission system to facilitate data accessibility, transparency and analysis.