Intangible cultural heritage is the people of all generations each other, and the life of the masses closely related to a variety of traditional cultural expressions and cultural space. Non material cultural heritage is not only the historical witness of the development, it is the precious, valuable cultural resources. China is a country with a long history of civilization, not only have a lot of material cultural heritage, but also a variety of intangible cultural heritage. The people of all our ethnic groups in the long-term production and life practice to create rich and colorful non-material cultural heritage of the Chinese nation, is the crystallization of the wisdom and civilization, is the link of national affection and maintain national unity based. To protect and make good use of the intangible cultural heritage in China, to implement the scientific outlook on development, implementation economy society the comprehensive, harmonious, can develop continuously have important sense. Non material cultural heritage census, is a country in the early twenty-first Century by a massive culture of the census, is a master of state and regional intangible cultural heritage contains status and understanding public feelings popular means. The census data and data, as part of a comprehensive analysis of the situation of one of important data, is the national or regional authorities to develop cultural policy and the important basis of formulation of policy. Survey of non material cultural heritage and intangible cultural heritage to the effective protection of endangered species, the intangible cultural heritage rescue foundation. Therefore, unite deploy according to the State Council, the national non material cultural heritage in the census, regardless of the Intangible Cultural Heritage Inheritance and development, or to the national surveys, has the important meaning.

非物質文化遺產是各族人民世代相承、與群眾生活密切相關的各種傳統文化表現形式和文化空間。非物質文化遺產既是歷史發展的見證，又是珍貴的、具有重要價值的文化資源。我國是一個歷史悠久的文明古國，不僅有大量的物質文化遺產，而且有豐富的非物質文化遺產。我國各族人民在長期生產生活實踐中創造的豐富多彩的非物質文化遺產，是中華民族智慧與文明的結晶，是連結民族情感的紐帶和維系國家統一的基礎。保護和利用好我國非物質文化遺產，對落實科學發展觀，實現經濟社會的全面、協調、可持續發展具有重要意義。非物質文化遺產的普查，是國家在21世紀初進行的一次大規模的文化普查，是掌握全國及各地區非物質文化遺產蘊藏狀況和了解民情民心的重要手段。普查所得的資料和數據，作為全面分析國情的重要資料之一，是國家或地區主管機構制定文化政策乃至制定國策的重要依據。非物質文化遺產普查又是對非物質文化遺產進行有效地保護，對瀕危的非物質文化遺產進行搶救的基礎。因此，根據國務院統一部署，對全國各地區的非物質文化遺產所進行的普查，無論對非物質文化遺產的繼承和發展，還是對國情的調查，都具有重要意義。