Harmonized commodity description and coding system, 2007 edition, and standard international trade classification, revision 4

Abstract

The Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS) came into force on 1 January 1988. In 1993, the Statistical Commission endorsed the use of HS at the national level in the compilation and dissemination of international merchandise trade statistics. By July 2005, the original HS had been amended by the World Customs Organization four times. Three amended editions of the HS had gone into force, on 1 January 1992, 1 January 1996 and 1 January 2002. The fourth amended edition (HS07) became effective beginning on 1 January 2007. HS07 has 5052 subheadings of which 4208 are subheadings from the original Harmonized System (HS88), which means that 844 non-original subheadings (17 per cent) were introduced in the subsequent HS editions (1 in 1992, 267 in 1996, 316 in 2002, and 260 in 2007).