The World Customs Organization (WCO) have conceived and developed the HSN codes in order to classify goods from all over the world in a systematic way. It’s adopted in over 200 countries, and it covers around 98% of all goods produced and traded in, under its ambit.
India has been a member of the World Customs Organization (WCO) since 1971. It originally used 6-digit HSN codes to classify commodities for Customs and Central Excise. Later, Customs and Central Excise added two more digits to make the codes more precise, resulting in an 8 digit classification.