National Official Register of the Territorial Division of the Country (TERYT) functions on ground of The Law of June 29^th, 1995 on official statistics (Journal of Laws No 88, position 439 with amendments) and the Regulation of the Council of Ministers of December 15th, 1998 on detailed principles of running, using and making available the territorial register and related to it obligations of the state administration agencies and the self-government entities  (Journal of Laws from year 1998 No 157, item 1031 with amendments).

TERYT register contains systems of:

• identifiers and names of units of administrative division,
• identifiers and names of localities,
• statistical regions and census enumeration areas,
• identification of addresses of streets, real estates, buildings and dwellings.

TERYT register identifiers:

• are a binding territorial identification standard for agencies running official registers and information systems of public administration,
• are used in other records, registers and systems regarding territorial units and enable integration of data gathered in these systems,
• can be applied on full or partial range, depending on needs of a given register or system,
• allow generalisation and presentation of social and economical phenomena in cross-sections with a different level of detail i.e.: voivodships, powiats, gminas, city quarters and representations in urban gminas, statistical regions and census enumeration areas, geodetic units used in land and building records, localities and streets, and also in division for towns and villages.

The geographic and cartography documentation (maps and situation sketches) is used for running of the territorial division register. It includes:

• course of unit borders:
  • of administrative division - of voivodships, powiats, gminas, towns, quarters, representations,
  • of statistical division - statistical regions and census enumeration areas,
  • of division used in evidence of land and buildings - geodetic units;
• names of localities and streets;
• buildings and their ordinal numbers.

Systems of TERYT register:

1. System of identifiers and names of administrative division units TERC

   System contains identifiers and names of units in the basic three-level territorial division of the country and is built on hierarchical numeration:

   • voivodships,
   • powiats,
   • gminas.

   The system distinguishes with separate identifiers:

   • cities with powiat status,
   • urban, rural and urban-rural gminas,
   • towns and rural areas in urban-rural gminas,
   • quarters and representations in urban gminas.

2. System of identifiers and localities names SIMC

   System contains:

   • official names of localities,
   • permanent, unique locality identifiers,
   • typical descriptions of localities,
   • territorial appurtenance of a locality to gmina, powiat and voivodship.

3. System of statistical regions and census enumeration areas BREC

   System contains identifiers of a division that was created for the purpose of population and housing censuses and conduct of sample surveys.

   • census enumeration area is a spatial unit distinguished for the purpose of population and housing censuses and other statistical surveys on base of the number of dwellings and population
   • statistical region is a spatial unit of statistical data aggregation composed of few, not more than nine census enumeration areas.

   During inter-census periods BREC99 system is the sampling frame for demographic and social surveys.

4. System for identification of street addresses, real estate, buildings and dwellings NOBC

   System contains building and dwelling addresses, in configuration of statistical regions and census enumeration area.

   On ground of system bases:

   • initial documentation for national population and housing censuses is prepared, in form of address specifications of buildings and dwellings,
   • samples are drawn and addresses of dwellings selected for sample surveys are established.

   Within the system a central catalogue of streets ULIC is maintained, which includes street names, in compliance with gmina regulations conferring those names, and their identifiers. It was created through alphabetical listing of streets across the whole country.

TERYT register is actualised with a predefined frequency:

• systems: of identifiers and names of administrative division units, identifiers and localities names, central catalogue of streets and ordinal numeration of real estate and buildings - on a current basis,
• systems: of statistical regions, census enumeration areas and street addresses, real estate, buildings and dwellings with regard to:
  • growth and loss of buildings - quarterly,
  • division into statistical regions and census enumeration areas - at least once a year.