ISO 3166

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ISO 3166 is a three-part standard published by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), and defines codes for the names of countries, dependent territories, and special areas of geographical interest, and their principal subdivisions. The official name is Codes for the representation of names of countries and their subdivisions. It was first published in 1974, and has been modified over the years, with subsequent editions published in 1981, 1988, and 1993. The most recent edition, its fifth, was published between 1997 and 1999.

Parts

Since the fifth edition, the standard has been divided into three parts:^[1]

• ISO 3166-1, Codes for the representation of names of countries and their subdivisions – Part 1: Country codes, defines codes for the names of countries, dependent territories, and special areas of geographical interest. ISO 3166 has included alphabetic country codes since its first edition in 1974, and numeric country codes since its second edition in 1981. The country codes were first published as ISO 3166-1 in 1997. It defines three sets of country codes:
  • ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 – two-letter country codes (most notably used for country code top-level domains)
  • ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 – three-letter country codes
  • ISO 3166-1 numeric – three-digit country codes
• ISO 3166-2, Codes for the representation of names of countries and their subdivisions – Part 2: Country subdivision code, defines codes for the names of the principal subdivisions (e.g., provinces or states) of all countries coded in ISO 3166-1. It was first published in 1998.
• ISO 3166-3, Codes for the representation of names of countries and their subdivisions – Part 3: Code for formerly used names of countries, defines codes for country names which have been deleted from ISO 3166-1 since its first publication in 1974. It was first published in 1999.

ISO 3166 Maintenance Agency

The ISO 3166 standard is maintained by the ISO 3166 Maintenance Agency (ISO 3166/MA), located at the ISO central office in Geneva. Originally it was located at the Deutsches Institut für Normung (DIN) in Berlin. Its principal tasks are:^[2]

• To add and to eliminate country names (respectively, country subdivision names) and to assign code elements to them;
• To publish lists of country names (respectively, country subdivision names) and code elements;
• To maintain a reference list of all country code elements and country subdivision code elements used and their period of use;
• To issue newsletters announcing changes to the code tables;
• To advise users on the application of ISO 3166.

Members

There are ten experts with voting rights on the ISO 3166/MA.^[3] Five are representatives of the following national standards organizations:

• Association française de normalisation (AFNOR) – France
• American National Standards Institute (ANSI) – United States
• British Standards Institution (BSI) – United Kingdom
• Deutsches Institut für Normung (DIN) – Germany
• Swedish Standards Institute (SIS) – Sweden

The other five are representatives of major UN or other international organizations who are all users of ISO 3166-1:

• International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
• International Telecommunication Union (ITU)
• Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)
• Universal Postal Union (UPU)
• United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE)

There are also associated members but they do not participate in votes.

See also

• ISO 639, codes for languages
• List of international vehicle registration codes
• Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS), codes used by the United States
• Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS), codes used by the European Union

References

1. ^ What is ISO 3166?
2. ^ Tasks of the ISO 3166/MA
3. ^ ISO 3166/MA members

External links

• ISO 3166 Maintenance Agency, International Organization for Standardization (ISO) – includes alpha-2 codes
• Standard Country or Area Codes for Statistical Use, United Nations Statistics Division – includes alpha-3 and numeric codes
• Appendix D – Cross-Reference List of Country Data Codes, CIA World Factbook – comparison of FIPS 10, ISO 3166, and STANAG 1059 country codes (public domain)
• Country codes, Statoids.com – comparison of many country codes