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It's the UCC (unique country code) for "Bookland".
The barcode on a book is a 13-digit EAN (European article number) which requires a country code. 978 was the UCC allocated to the International ISBN Agency so they could extend their 10 digit ISBN to 13 digits (therefore making the ISBN-13 and EAN identical) at the same time as extending the ISBN number space (by allowing the use of 979 and further UCCs).
hamrack
@aggi
Why do ISBN 13s start with 978 (or 979)? How were these three numbers chosen?