The Queen at the World Child & Youth Forum, 2014. Photo: Henrik Garlöv/royalcourt.se
In the spring of 1999 The Queen took the initiative of founding the World Childhood Foundation. The mission of the Foundation is to work toward better living conditions for children all over the world. The Foundation supports a large number of projects in different countries. Today, Childhood has offices in Sweden, Brazil, Germany and the US.
The Queen is the founder and Honorary Member of the International Mentor Foundation. The focus of this organisation is the prevention of drug abuse.
The purpose of Global Child Forum is to create a forum to increase awareness of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, and inspire more people to take initiative and act in the spirit of the Convention. The Foundation was initiated by the Royal Family in 2010 as a project of the World Childhood Foundation, and was converted in 2012 to a private foundation.
The Silvia Home for dementia patients, located in Drottningholm, is a result of The Queen's initiative and personal commitment. The Silvia Home Foundation, which The Queen chairs and with which she works actively, promotes scientific research and offers education, specialised training and care in the field of dementia.
The Queen works actively on behalf of the disabled. She chairs the Royal Wedding Fund, which supports research in sports and athletics for disabled young people.
She also chairs the Queen Silvia Jubilee Fund for research on children and disability.
The Queen has studied sign language in order to be able to communicate more effectively with the hearing impaired.
Queen Silvia holds honorary positions in a large number of organisations and societies, such as the Swedish Amateur Athletic Association, the Children's Cancer Foundation of Sweden and Save the Children Sweden.