The land area of the world is divided into countries. Most of the countries are, in turn, divided into smaller units. These units may be called states, provinces, regions, governorates, and so on. A phrase that describes them all is “major administrative divisions of countries”. Due to shortcomings of related de-jure standards a hierarchical set of subdivision codes, called Hierarchical Administrative Subdivision Codes (HASC), has been devised, extending in many cases to secondary administrative divisions. This is not an official standard, sanctioned by any international body. The codes are intended for internal use within a database or other computer system and not for display.