Speech of Mr Marko Janssen, the General Manager of Melia Zanzibar

Dear all,

First of all, we appreciate your presence here today. We are proud to contribute to such a worthy cause as the Child Protection and this is a magnificent occasion to share with you the Meliá Hotels International & UNICEF Alliance.

As well, we would be extremely grateful for you to join us today in support of UNICEF and become another ally in this partnership.

Since November 2010, this alliance gives us the opportunity to get involved in defending basic children’s rights, mobilising resources to contribute to human development and promote a more responsible, ethical and charitable society.

We are working hard to make this alliance a reality and develop a real and long-lasting commitment which involves all of our stakeholders; our guests, our employees, our suppliers, our partners, and society in general.

There are more than 500 million children who are victims of violence in the world. In the last three decades 30 million children have lost their innocence and their childhood due to sexual exploitation. More than 1 million boys and girls enter the sex trade each year.

That is why Meliá Hotels International is committed to promoting the work carried out by UNICEF and to cooperating financially in their projects and actions in an area of vital importance; child protection.

The involvement and commitment to childhood protection is present in Meliá since a long time because we are a familiar company with traditional values such as social responsibility and solidarity with the local environment we are working with.

The entity of the initiatives developed has increased its weight and strength with a constant commitment to materialize a Strategic Alliance stable and consolidated.

Our Company has been the first corporation in Spain to sign and join the United Nations Global Compact and the ECPAT Code, and we have achieved a role of promote and encourage other companies of our industry to join it as well.

As a glance, we have involved more than 200 of our hotels around the world and trained our 35.000 collaborators to act as ambassadors of UNICEF in those destinations we are operating in. We are doing our best to increase this implication.

Worldwide, working together and involving collaborators and guests, we have raised more than 600.000€ that have been entirely donated to UNICEF in order to support different projects, programmes and initiatives especially focused on education and the fight against sexual exploitation.

We really appreciate your cooperation and your support for our cause here at Meliá Zanzibar. We want you to be ambassadors and an active driver to support this cause, our cause.

Thank you so much for being here with us and enjoy the day!