Thank you. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to this conference call on the Veolia H1 2020 Results. I will present these results with Estelle Brachlianoff, our COO, and Claude Laruelle, our CFO. We will then take all your questions. Before starting, please note that the conference call will end at 9:00 A.M. sharp, as EDF has agreed to slightly postpone its H1 call so that analysts and investors covering both stocks can listen to the two calls. I will start by the key highlights of the first half, obviously marked by the COVID outbreak. I am on slide five of the slideshow. The last part of Veolia's activities have proven resilient, such as essential municipal services, but other businesses have been more impacted, such as C&I waste or construction works or industrial maintenance. Our reaction to the outbreak of the crisis was swift, comprehensive, and efficient.
An adaptation plan was immediately put in place, targeting EUR 200 million of additional cost savings in 2020, on top of the existing EUR 250 million efficiency program for the year. The great success of this plan at the end of June has enabled us to increase it to EUR 250 million. Recovery began in May and was very strong in June, with June revenue reaching 97% of June 2019. Savings on renewable CapEx have also been decided that all development CapEx have been maintained to fuel our expected growth in the years ahead. Veolia enjoys a very strong liquidity position. With this very encouraging end to the semester, we aim to recover our 2019 level of operational performance as of Q4 2020. More details and figures on slide six. Revenue in H1 is down by 5.6% at constant scope and exchange rate.
-EUR 912 million, but only -EUR 88 million in the month of June. EBITDA is down by 17% in the first half or -EUR 403 million, but only -EUR 27 million in June. This EBITDA decrease goes down to current EBIT and to correct net income, which stood this corrected income at EUR 7 million in H1. Thanks to CapEx savings and working capital improvements, free cash flow is down by only EUR 40 million compared to H1 2019. Finally, net financial debt is down by EUR 600 million compared to last year. During the crisis, and I am on slide seven, the group provided the full range of its essential services in all its geographies, including in the most affected countries, while offering maximal protection to all those of our employees who were at their workstation every day.
We also reassured all of our other employees, enabling them to come back to their place of work as soon as possible. This policy has been very well received, enabling the group to quickly return to a nearly normal activity level. Moreover, the very swift roll out of the Recover and Adapt Plan has allowed us to generate EUR 120 million of savings at the end of June, of which EUR 50 million have come from the government job support schemes. These quick results have enabled us to increase the initial target of savings coming from this Recover and Adapt Plan from EUR 200 million to EUR 250 million in 2020, and Estelle will give you details in a few moments. We also decided to reduce our renewable CapEx by EUR 500 million during the year, which has already borne fruit in H1 and protected free cash flow.
On the other hand, as already mentioned, development CapEx have all been maintained, even if some had to be postponed by a few months due to the sanitary crisis. These development project will fuel the group growth as of next year. These development projects are summarized on slide eight. They related to new discretionary growth CapEx devoted to increasing our hazardous waste treatment capacities in China, in the Middle East, and in Singapore. As well as our plastic and organic waste recycling capacities in Asia. They also include acquisitions in hazardous waste activities in the U.S., as well as new water, waste, and energy developments in Central and Eastern Europe. You see on slide nine, the group's achievements of our two cost-cutting plans. The usual efficiency program, targeting EUR 250 million in 2020, is on track at the end of June, with EUR 131 million achieved in H1.
The additional adaptation plan achieved EUR 120 million of new savings at the end of June, of which, as already mentioned, EUR 50 million coming from government job support schemes put in place in various countries where we operate. This quick success has allowed us to increase the target from 200 to 250. A portion of these savings will be recurring beyond 2020. In total, in this very special year, 2020, Veolia's cost savings will reach more than EUR 500 million. Estelle will now summarize the main impacts of COVID on our operations. Estelle, the floor is yours.
Thank you, Antoine. I will now give you a little color on the impact that COVID has had on our various geographies and various type of businesses, and on the way we have reacted both quickly and strongly. On slide 10, you will see that the vast majority of our geographies have shown good resilience. Asia and Latin America has kept growing, although at a slow pace due to some project delays. Japan in particular, has enjoyed 8.8% revenue growth thanks to a very strong municipal water business and new industrial water projects as well. Four other regions, rest of Europe, Africa and Middle East, Pacific and North America, have resisted well with very slight revenue declines between 1% and 2%.
In the U.S., for instance, net of the recent sale of our district heating business, revenue is down by only 1.6%, thanks to a very solid hazardous waste activity and resilient municipal water. France remains the hardest hit due to a very strict and long lockdown, has enjoyed a vigorous rebound since June. I will now detail this impact by business, starting with municipal water on slide 11. Altogether, this activity has proven its resilience with a very limited drop in water volumes compared to last year. In France, for instance, volumes have been flat. We have seen lower volumes in cities such as Marseille in the south of France, which have been offset by stronger ones in our many other cities.
Same situation in some of Eastern Europe, where a lower volume in the Czech Republic due to lack of tourists in Prague, has been offset by increased volume in the other countries. The situation is obviously very different in our construction activities, as shown on slide 12. Those were suddenly and massively impacted by the lockdown, as most of our works were simply stopped. We adapted our ways of working to social distancing requirements, and we were able to convince our customers to reopen, leading to a massive bounce back in activity. As we speak, our activity level is even slightly higher than last year with some catch-up effect. Solid waste now on slide 13 bundles together quite different situations, starting with our collection activities first. As expected, municipal collection has resisted well.
Commercial and industrial waste collection has been severely hit by the lockdown, but the rebound has been massive and quick since June, as you can see on the graph very clearly. France and Germany are back to 100%, the U.K., which entered and exited lockdown later, is back to 80% as we speak. As far as treatment is concerned now, priority has been given to our incineration facilities, we've been able to maintain utilization rates above 90% in all our geographies through the crisis. In terms of landfills, after a significant decrease during the lockdown with construction waste lifting in particular, volumes are back up to more than 90% of 2019 volumes in June. Last but not least, in terms of pricing, I'm very pleased that we've been able to maintain our pricing strategy all the way through.
Moving to hazardous waste now on slide 14. Our solid and balanced portfolio of industrial customers enabled our activity to hold up well. Revenues was down by only 3.5% in H1, with EBITDA margins maintained at above 15%. I'm very pleased to see that volumes are now back to a level of almost 95%. Switching to district heating now on slide 15. This activity is very resilient, this was fully confirmed in H1, as you can see on the graph as well. On page 16, to summarize, most of our activities have shown good resilience in the past few months. For those that were most affected, the rebound has been quick and massive thanks to our swift and effective response. To mitigate the impact of the crisis and on our results, we immediately introduced a specific Recover and Adapt Plan, targeting additional cost savings of EUR 200 million in 2020.
I'm pleased that we were able to deliver EUR 120 million in additional savings in H1, which enables us to increase this target to EUR 250 million now. Of course, this adaptation plan includes some one-off initiatives such as furloughs or travel bans and a recruitment freeze, but some more sustainable measures as well. For instance, the digital transformation of our operations has been accelerated, and we won't go back to pre-existing methods. Just to give you a few examples, we have adjusted our maintenance plans to adapt to reduced level of activity and totally redesign our shutdown plan for the next 18 months. Digital payments of water bills has become the norm in many new countries. Artificial intelligence has supported our fleet management in order to adapt our daily rounds to customer needs.
Basically, we're seizing every single opportunity to learn from the crisis in terms of operational performance, digital solutions, and so on and so forth. Had to be featured and more agile going forward. Difficult to assess already the exact split between what is one-off and what is recurring, but I believe that roughly one-third of those measures could generate recurring savings. Those recurring savings will help offset the few percent points of activity that may still be missing at year-end, allowing us to target the same level of performance at year-end as in 2019. Back to you, Antoine.
Thank you, Estelle. To conclude this presentation of the key highlights, before handing over to Claude, who will give you all the details, slide 17 summarizes our objectives for the rest of the year. With the strong rebound of our activity in June, we aim to recover our 2019 level of operational performance as early as Q4 2020, in the absence of a second wave of the sanitary crisis. We would then be in a position to begin 2021 having offset all the consequences of the COVID crisis and to pursue our strategic plan thanks to the maintained development CapEx. Indeed, the sanitary crisis has, by no means, done away the global ecological emergency. The strategic program which we presented to you last February, Impact 2023, remains completely valid.
Veolia will in fact be ideally placed to benefit from the stimulus packages on their way in many geographies, a significant part of which will be dedicated to the ecological transformation. This is exactly the goal we have set ourselves with our Impact 2023 plan, to be the best company in the world for ecological transformation. This ambition is more timely than ever. Finally, let me remind you on slide 18 that this ambition is based on our enlarged vision of our company's usefulness to society as expressed in our corporate purpose. This vision of a multidimensional performance that benefits all our stakeholders will translate into measurable financial and non-financial objectives, on which the bonuses of our executives will be based.
All of these objectives, focusing on what we bring to shareholders, employees, clients, the planet, and society at large, are shown in this chart, which was also presented to you last February. This broad and extended vision of our group's usefulness and performance is, in my mind, more appropriate and relevant than ever in the new economic environment. Veolia will honor its commitment. I now hand over to Claude for the details of our H1. Claude, the floor is yours.
Thank you, Antoine. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm on slide 20. As Antoine told you, the H1 performance has been marked by the COVID outbreak, impacting first the revenue, especially in Q2, after the EUR 192 million that we presented for Q1, which is down by 5.6% at constant scope and ForEx in H1. With pretty much the same level of EBITDA to revenue impact as Q1, as a reminder, when we lose during the lockdown EUR 1 million of revenue, we lose 40%-50% of that amount in EBITDA. EBITDA is down by EUR 403 million compared to last year or -17.3% at constant scope and ForEx. Current EBIT at EUR 438 million is down slightly more at EUR 419 million versus last year. This slight increase is a variation in absolute value due to the COVID impact on our JVs for EUR 16 million.
That leads to a current net income group share, which is positive at EUR 7 million for the first half, which is encouraging for the second part of the year. Net industrial CapEx have been well managed by our BUs under the framework that were put in place with the Recover and Adapt Plan. The H1 CapEx are limited to EUR 873 million, and we will achieve the CapEx reduction of EUR 500 million that we have committed to, which means full-year CapEx of around EUR 2 billion. Thanks to a very focused and disciplined management of our cash and a better level of our working capital, the net debt is much lower than last year at EUR 11.8 billion. Finally, ForEx was not favorable in Q2 with a total impact for H1 that you can see in the table on the right-hand side of the slide.
This is due to the fact that the euro is stronger in relation to many emerging currencies, especially in Latin America. I'm on slide 21. Let's focus on Q2 numbers in the table. Q2 experienced a significant decrease in all our geographies, starting by France, -16.1%. Water volumes were stable, works were down in April and May, as Estelle told you, and are fully resuming as we speak. Waste volumes hit a low point in April, with C&I at around 50%, followed by a strong recovery in May, June. June frame was much better, few volume were still missing. We also experienced some waste inventory release in June, which helped the monthly volumes. Regarding rest of Europe, -6.7%, Central Europe was the most resilient geography because of its energy and water business.
Waste volumes were lower in the U.K., Germany, and Northern Europe, are recovering since April. June, as you can see on the slide, is well-oriented, +0.2%. For the rest of the world, -5.7%, it's a mixed bag. The segment is impacted, of course, by the disposal of our district heating in the U.S. last year. Asia had a better Q2 than Q1 with the business, which is back to normal in June. As we told you, some developments have been delayed. LATAM is still dealing with the virus as we speak. Global businesses are down by 20.8% in Q2. This is due to the very strong hit in April and May on construction activities, the temporary lack of volume for hazardous waste activities in Europe, and the reduction of industrial services.
As you can see, due to the effort that we have made to resume construction works in France, the segment is almost back to normal in June, with a -2.3% compared to last year. Overall, Q2 is at 89% revenue compared to last year, and June shows a strong move upwards at 97%. I'm on slide 22, where we have the revenue bridge. As I said, the ForEx had a negative impact, 0.8% negative on revenue during the semester. The scope effect is mostly the divesture of the district heating in the U.S., partly compensated by takings closed over the last 12 months. You can see on the slide that the major impact, of course, is the volume impact for -EUR 813 million, which is entirely due to the COVID effect.
The weather impact is significantly reduced compared to Q1, -EUR 2 million in H1 versus -EUR 13 million in Q1, thanks to the cold weather in Central Europe in April and May. Regarding recyclates, paper was a good surprise in Q2 due to the lack of paper collection and a robust demand from the industry. Since the peak in April, the paper prices are now normalizing, but it was not enough to compensate for the Q1 price decrease. A source of satisfaction, we have been able to maintain a good level of price increase despite the crisis and the volume drop in Q2. This is reflected in the price effect for plus EUR 143 million. I'm on slide 23. You can easily see that the impact of the most affected segment in our activities, which is the commercial and industrial waste.
To give you an order of magnitude, C&I waste collection and treatment represent roughly 40% of our total waste activities. As you can see on the slide, the total waste volumes are down by 14.7% in Q2, which reflects the impact of the lockdown on C&I waste in Europe. On the price side, Q2 price increases remain strong at plus 1.9%. As I said, we are very disciplined on waste pricing. Regarding the geography, France, as we started its sorting facilities in May and kept a high level on incineration volumes, as Estelle told you. The U.K. did not stop its operation at all. Incinerators producing most of the margin remained full in Q2. The U.K. experienced a drop of landfill volume and on C&I collection.
Asia, hazardous waste is back to normal in June. The U.S. was impacted by the lower activities from the refineries, partly compensated by new business. Hazardous waste Europe is recovering sharply after a low April, now above 90%. In total, our global hazardous waste revenues are down by only 3.5% in H1 year-on-year to EUR 1.2 billion. I'm on slide 24. As you can see on the slide, EBITDA variation can be explained by four main items. Scope effect, -EUR 37 million due to the disposal of our district heating business in the U.S. Scope effect, volume effect, - EUR 431 million due to the COVID impact, partly compensated by our Recover and Adapt Plan. Our usual cost-cutting plan of plus EUR 131 million, as we were able to continue to implement our cost-cutting plan during the lockdown. We will achieve the EUR 250 million target for the year.
The usual price-cost squeeze for -EUR 69 million. One more thing to mention is the contribution of the energy prices, plus EUR 47 million in Europe, as a result of our hedging policy that we have put in place. We have sold over 90% of our electricity on January 1st, which is protecting this activity from the price drop we have seen in Q2. Let's review now in more details our activities by geography. I start by France on slide 25. Water volumes in France remain well-oriented. If you take into account that the economy went down in Q2 by roughly 14%, and overall, the water volumes were flat in H1. The water distribution activity has proven to be a very resilient business, and the tariff increase is in line with Q1, plus 1.5%.
The impact you can see on the revenue is mostly due to the works associated with our contracts that have been stopped during the lockdown in France. Regarding our waste activities, as we said, the lockdown had a very significant impact in April, and we even shut down some of our sorting facilities, whilst we kept our essential services for collection, incineration, and landfill in operation. May was better with the restart of all our operations, and June was much better, almost close to a normal month, as a result of volumes coming from waste inventory release that were brought by citizens to civic amenities just after the lockdown, and that were sent for final treatment afterwards. The EBITDA in France is significantly down by 22.5% with two main reasons, the drop in waste volume and the stop of the works in our French water operation.
Let's move to the rest of Europe. I'm now on page 26. As you can see, Central Europe was a very resilient business, [audio distortion]. Northern Europe, which is mostly Germany, was hit by the lockdown. It's recovering quickly.
Italy, Iberia are very stable in revenue because on essential energy services. The EBITDA for rest of Europe is down by 12.1% at constant ForEx, which reflects the effect of the lockdown in all our European countries, mostly on our waste activities as well our lower on-site industrial services. I'm on slide 27. The COVID effect was moderate on the rest of the world segment, with the revenue down by 3.7% for H1. If you take into account the disposal of the district heating effect, only - 1.1%. This is due to the rebound of Asia in Q2, where we are back to normal activity in June after a gradual recovery. Because of the embark growth, the region is growing by 4.7% in H1. Latin America came late in the crisis in wave 3, and has not yet recovered.
A majority of our activity is municipal, which explains the good resistance of the business. North America is almost flat at constant scope and ForEx at - 1.6% inorganic. Our people were able to compensate the loss of activities in refineries waste recycling by transforming low-value waste acid into surfactants for industrial clients. The municipal water activity was very resilient, with no volume impact. Pacific, - 0.5%, where the vast majority of our activity is waste management, experienced some volume drop in C&I, but compensated by better industrial services. In Africa and Middle East, Morocco had a very stringent lockdown, leading to significant drop of energy consumption. The situation is getting much better as we speak.
EBITDA of the rest of the world is down by 27.8%, due first to the disposal of the district heating in the U.S. at the end of last year. Second, to the impact of the crisis on a large part of our activities, only partly compensated by the organic growth in some segments, like for example, hazardous waste or district heating in China. I'm now on page 28. Just as a quick reminder, our global business segment has mostly two businesses, construction and technology on one side with VWT and SADE, hazardous waste and industrial services on the other side. Starting by the construction activity. VWT was stable in H1 due to the three desalination projects in the Middle East that are compensating the lower activity in Europe.
SADE is making 70% of its activity in public works in France and therefore was impacted by the strict lockdown in this country. It is now back to 100% activity because of the restart of all the construction sites in France. The hazardous waste business had a low and is coming back step by step to almost normal activity, with today, all the 14 incinerators that are running. The EBITDA, of course, decreased by 53.9% due to the active construction works at SADE during the lockdown and in hazardous waste activities in relation with lower treatment volumes. Q3 and Q4 look much more promising. I'm on slide 29. You can see the translation of EBITDA into EBIT. We have the same effect as Q1 with EBIT variation in absolute value, as I said, slightly higher than the EBITDA variation.
This is due to the decrease in the contribution from our non-consolidated JVs for -EUR 16 million. As Estelle showed you on the graph, June is also marking a turning point, with water volumes in our Chinese concession up 7% compared to last year. Regarding the provisions, the variation is mostly coming from insurance provision, -EUR 20 million this year in H1, which is a cautious number compared to -EUR 7 million last year. I'm on slide 30, where you can see the translation of EBIT into current net income. The cost of the net financial debt is improving by EUR 6 million thanks to the active debt management and the refinancing of our euro debt, which leads to EUR 11 million of savings. We will continue to experience this effect as we refinance our euro debt every year with a much lower interest rate.
We issued three medium-term notes this year with maturity between eight and 12 years and coupons between 0.66% and 1.25%. For H1, this positive effect is partly offset by the cost of non euro denominated debt. The share for minority shareholders, -EUR 67 million this year, is going down in line with the net income reduction where we have minority partners. This leads to a positive current net income of EUR 7 million for the first semester. Moving to slide 31. You have the details of the net income group share of -EUR 138 million, coming first from COVID-related very specific costs linked to the protection of our employees for EUR 33 million. Second, from non-current asset impairment in Latin America and Morocco for EUR 74 million and some restructuring charges. I am now on slide 32.
As I said, CapEx were well managed in H1, down compared to last year, while we maintain our discretionary CapEx at EUR 128 million. The change in working capital was significantly reduced by EUR 225 million compared to last year. It gives us a good free cash flow at the end of Q2 in line with last year and a net debt reduced by more than EUR 600 million versus June 2019 at EUR 11.8 billion. On slide 33, regarding our liquidity position, it remains very strong, even stronger than March 30th. The cash available at group level is now EUR 7.9 billion, as we have issued two medium-term notes in April for EUR 700 million and in June for EUR 500 million.
We have already refinanced the three medium-term notes issuances of November, December, and January next year, totaling EUR 1.5 billion. We therefore have absolutely no liquidity issue. I'm on slide 34. You can see the debt maturity schedule and see that we don't have anything to refinance before Q1 2022. On slide 35, you have the details of the net debt variation compared to end of last year with all the effects I have just mentioned. On slide 36, you have the 2020 outlook that Antoine mentioned during his presentation. Our objective for 2020 is to recover our operational performance in Q4, and thanks to the new development that we have maintained to start 2021, having offset the COVID impact. Thank you very much for your attention.
Thank you, Claude. We can now go to the Q&A session.
Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press zero one on your telephone keypad. zero and one. We have first question from James Brand from Deutsche Bank. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. I mainly wanted to just try and get a bit more idea over what the assumptions are around the comments that you've just made and have made several times in the presentation about ending the year on a similar kind of run rate to the one you ended 2019. I guess obviously one of the assumptions is not having a second wave. In terms of how you're thinking about it, are you thinking maybe that there's going to be a sustained revenue impact or a sustained volume impact of 1% or 2%? I'm not trying to put words in your mouth, but of maybe 1% or 2% going into next year, that you've got the cost cutting kicking in and you've got some new projects kicking in, and those two factors offset the volume impact.
I'd be interested in kind of just getting a bit of a clearer idea of what assumptions you have going into that. I guess obviously pricing as well. You're saying that you haven't even been able to maintain your pricing. As I understand it, on the waste business, the main price negotiations are often.
Thank you, James Brand. Estelle will answer your question.
Thank you. First question on the objective by year-end, you understood well, which is we anticipate that there may be a few percentage points of activity still missing at year-end. Thanks to all our effort, including the Recover and Adapt Plan, we intend to compensate those, therefore, allowing us to target what we've told you today, which is basically EBITDA at the same level as 2019 in Q4. Starting therefore the year 2021, having compensated for all the impact of COVID. You understood well. I'm trying to describe it in other words. In terms of pricing, you have the documents. I'm trying to find back the pages, but it's 2.2% of price effect in the waste we've seen in H1, which is very clear.
If you see the comparing between Q1 and Q2, we have 2.5% in Q1, but it is 1.9% in Q2, which is very good. Basically, we're maintaining this pricing strategy, which is aiming at pricing in terms of the value creation, of course. Have a look at what has value within the waste and price it differently from what has less value within the waste. Therefore, depending on the destination of it, if it's burned, if it's recycled, or if there is nothing else, then landfilling it. Yes, we are very pleased to see that we've been able to maintain that in Q1 and Q2 and all together in H1.
Another question.
Thank you. Next question from Emmanuel Quirin from Societe Generale. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Good morning, everybody. First question on guidance. Your message on Q4 is indeed quite powerful, and it looks good for 2021. I would like to focus on bridging between now on Q4, so focusing on 3Q. We had a run rate of COVID-related losses, so to speak, of around EUR 27 million in June. What are you anticipating for Q3, and what are you seeing in July, essentially? Should we expect some COVID-related losses tailing off as we go nearer Q4? Should we assume, I don't know, EUR 25 million per month for Q3? Any guidance on that would be good. Second question. I noted that your guidance for EBITDA Q4 to be flat versus 2019 was at 2019 ForEx. Could you save us time and give us an idea of the mark to market of the ForEx impact for Q4?
Lastly, going below EBIT, do you mind steering us on maybe financial charges on specifically tax on minorities, taxes being, sometimes a bit difficult when we have got disruptions of the nature that we had this year. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Emmanuel. Claude will answer your question precisely. To be very clear for all of you, by reaching the operational performance in Q4 compatible the same level of 2019, it is meaning, as Estelle explained, EBITDA at constant ForEx. You have also now the Q2, the month of June, I give you the Q4, the link between both will come from Claude, if possible.
Good morning, Emmanuel. To answer your question about Q3, what we are anticipating, first of all, July, I would say roughly is similar to June. It was well-positioned, as we have seen the rebound in June. No very big difference in July. Some positive effect as Estelle mentioned in the U.K. What we anticipate for Q3 is a couple of dozens of millions per month. We can't give you, of course, a precise number, this is what we anticipate for Q3 going forward. To answer your question about the ForEx, to me, if I talk about the ForEx for Q3, Q4, the main impact could be the US dollar and the British pound, the British pound impact and the sterling.
Quite difficult to forecast Q4, but if you have to take into account ForEx, you have to take into account those two main currencies in terms of ForEx impact. What we can say is a couple of dozens of EUR million ForEx for the quarter.
Could be around EUR 40 million-EUR 50 million at the end of the year.
Yes. For H2.
For H2.
For H2. You were talking about on minorities. I guess your question is about the JVs. We don't anticipate much variation in terms of tax for our JVs. No big differences in terms of tax, the contribution on net income from our JVs.
Meaning, Emmanuel, that the EBITDA performance at constant ForEx will naturally go down to current EBIT and current net income.
Thank you for your answers. To put you on the spot, a quick calculation gives me, if I take a couple of dozens of EUR millions per month in Q3, EUR 50 million of ForEx, overall, in H1, seems to point to around EUR 3.5 billion of EBITDA full year as a simple calculation. Does that sound correct?
It is not enough.
Claude. I will do my math then.
Yeah, exactly. We can talk to you in detail about it, but I think we are more positive than that.
Thank you very much.
Thank you. Next question from Olivier Van Doosselaere from Exane. Go ahead.
Yes. Good morning on my side as well. Thank you for taking our questions. I had three, if I may as well. You had a good evolution in working capital in H1 versus what you did last year. I wonder to what extent do you think you can retain that, or if it's likely to reverse again in the second half of the year. Secondly, you mentioned how you think you still have some opportunities to further reduce your cost of debt in coming years, given refinancings. I was wondering if you could give us a bit of color on that one. Finally, there were some press articles about potential disposals that you might do in the coming periods.
I won't ask you to comment on those specific disposals on which you might be negotiating, but I wonder, in general, how you see the appetite at the moment for M&A in the market, and maybe what type of assets are still in demand and what type of assets might be more complicated to sell. That's it from me.
For the working capital, Claude?
Yeah, I start by the working capital. What we are seeing, we have a good level of working capital, and what we are seeing is no big issue on payment. What we expect is a reversal of the working capital at the end of the year, as we have seen in the past years. No big change in the working capital management. Regarding the cost of debt, as you have seen, we have refinanced the cost a little bit early this year to take advantage of quite a good situation of the market. Reason why we issued early in June, in April, and in January this year. We have a little bit of cost of carry this year. If you have to see what could be the outlook is to have a little bit less cost of carry for next year.
With the refinancing of our existing debt, you will have a better impact, a good impact, a positive impact in financial costs for 2021. As we will refinance 2022, you have seen that we have two issues to refinance in 2022. We'll have, again, a better effect in 2022 as we have to refinance EUR 1.3 billion in 2022. Positive for the euro cost of debt in 2021 and in 2022 compared to this year.
About the rumor of U.S. Water operational disposal, this disposal is not on our 2020 agenda. You know, that the group is planning to divest around EUR 3 billion of asset as part of the Impact 2023 strategic plan, and we can say that half of it will have been realized at the end of this year, but the timing and the assets remaining to sell have not been decided yet. You know that given the very strong balance sheet we have today, there is no rush for us to proceed with asset divestiture too early.
Okay. That's very clear. Thanks very much.
Another question?
Thank you. Next question from Vincent Ayral from JP Morgan. Please go ahead.
Yes, good morning, everyone. Got some issues there with the queue, so I may have missed a few questions there, but I'll go back to guidance. Another way to look at it is, I have in front of my eyes a consensus of EUR 3.6 billion of EBITDA, for the full year. I understand from your various comment that EUR 3.5 is a bit low. How comfortable are you with this consensus, especially knowing that the tone of your presentation seems to be fairly upbeat, so I would be interested in that. Second question is regarding the 2023 guidance. We see that the wording is evolving, in Q1 and now in H1. Has it become unrealistic? Is it that you lost a full year of growth and it's not achievable, or is it depending upon basically the implementation of your asset rotation? How do you look at it?
Is this an opportunity, this crisis at the end of the day, and it's too early to make a call on 2023? It's just for us to understand the momentum on this side of the equation. Finally, I think your slides were pretty good, showing every month the momentum for every type of activity and where we were on volumes. That was very useful I would say. Now, the question I have is regarding waste. Basically, you're back at 100% in France and Germany, still lagging a bit in the U.K., but there were some element of potential catch-up there. What is the situation as you see it as of today? Has this catch-up finally gone through the system? Are we normalized, and if so, at which type of level? Thank you very much.
Okay. Estelle will answer your third question. I will answer the second one. Claude will begin with the consensus.
Yes. First, bonjour and good morning, Vincent. Today, when I look at the analyst forecast for 2020, I would say that it's very widespread. I understand that for an analyst, it's difficult to make a forecast. As you said, the average, the mathematical average, is around EUR 3.6 billion, and for us, this order of magnitude makes sense.
Thank you, Claude, it is confirming what we said to Emmanuel a few minutes ago. What we could hope at the end of this plan. I told you that our objective is to begin 2021, first, having offset all the consequences of the crisis on our actual business. Meaning at the same level of profitability we had at the beginning of this year. Second, having maintained all our development projects, organic or financial, even with some few months late, we will have the profit of this development as we forecasted. Third, in 2021, of course, we will be in a position to develop all our development projects of that year, meaning that we will have lost less than one year on our global program through the crisis.
Having said that, should we or not be in a position to get the few months we lost until 2023? It is too early to answer to you. It is not impossible. We will precise that in a few months from now because it is a bit too early. You see, in what position we will be at the end of the year. We have the hope to be able to develop all our Impact 2023 projects till this end of program.
Regarding your third question, first, thanks for your positive comments on our graphs. In terms of the waste activity, you're right to say we've seen a very good rebound in June in pretty much all our geographies. U.K. was still lagging behind, but has reached something around 80% as we speak. We still are seeing some missing volumes in construction and demolition waste in certain landfills or in the U.K. C&I, as I just mentioned. It's fair to say we are nearer to a normalization point. I guess, is there some catching up effect? Yes, there are some, probably. How far, for how long, how deep? It's difficult to say. As we speak, July so far has been on the same type of trend as June, except U.K., which is better.
It's possible that in the end, we'll still be missing a few percent points of activities, as I've mentioned, in waste. Hence the Recover and Adapt Plan, which is here to compensate for the potential effect on our EBITDA and targeting to be coming back at a normalized EBITDA level at the end of the year. We still have a little bit of work to do, but work is on the way. Plus, the bouncing back is quite strong.
Perhaps we have the time to take a last question before the EDF begins its call.
Yes. We have one last question from Sarath and Mitchell from HSBC. Please go ahead.
Morning. It's Sarath here from HSBC. Just a couple of questions. Firstly, on M&A for second half, have you got very strong cash and liquidity position? Are you thinking about continuing your modest acquisitions to try and achieve a guidance? The first question. Second is just a clarification report. Do you have any staff in France or U.K. or other markets still under government furlough schemes? Just one quick third one. Can you just give us a bit of color about your Central European contract negotiations and what we should be expecting in terms of progress for them? Thank you.
You can. I guess on the second question, maybe if you could restate. If you say, have we used the various furloughing schemes in various countries, yes, we have. In Europe mainly, and the equivalent in the U.S., so paid furlough, the CARES Act in the U.S. Yes, we have. The equivalent part of in our EUR 120 million Recover and Adapt Plan for H1, as we mentioned, around EUR 50 million of it would be related to paid furlough supported by government schemes. I hope it's your question.
About the M&A during the second half.
The M&A. If your question is, are we going on with our tuck-in policy? The answer is yes, obviously, we haven't slowed down. We are going on. It's not just to maintain our competitiveness, just because it's good policy, easy to integrate, and it goes directly into the bottom line. Yes, we are going on.
It is nine o'clock. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for your presence on that call. Thank you very much. Of course, you know that our IR department is at your disposal to any question and precision. Have a good day and goodbye.