Welcome to the quarterly presentation for NRC Group. After the presentation, Lene, our communication director, will facilitate a Q&A session. For those of you who participate on the stream, you can write questions in the chat. 2021 has been a good year for NRC Group, and quarter four confirms the positive financial and operational trend. Revenue for the quarter was NOK 1.6 billion and organic growth of 7%. The profit for the quarter was up by NOK 60 million, and the systematic work we have put down for the last two years are clearly yielding results. The order intake for the quarter was NOK 500 million above last year and ended up at NOK 1.9 billion, so the third consecutive quarter with a book-to-bill significantly above one.
We also saw a strong operating cash flow of NOK 149 million, an improvement from NOK 110 million last year. Quarter four showed an improvement on all key financial metrics. Looking at full year figures, we can also see the positive trend. We started out the year with a low order book, and that has led to a moderate decline in revenues. However, we have used this opportunity to improve our core processes and built a strong foundation for profitable growth. We have seen a strong increase in EBITDA margins from 0.9% and 0.8% for the past two years to 2.3% this year in the higher end of our guided range. With a strong operating cash flow, our net interest-bearing debt is down to NOK 891 million.
Combined with improved profitability, the ratio between net interest-bearing debt versus adjusted EBITDA is down from 4.2 starting the year to 2.7 end of year. We are getting closer to our long-term target of staying below 2.5 on this ratio. With a continued good order intake throughout the year, we end the year with a 20% higher order book than last year. We expect the improvement in operational and financial development to continue into 2022. We expect a moderate to strong growth in revenue, and we expect a moderate increase in EBITDA margins versus 2021. We have mixed results within HSE. We have had too many lost time accidents throughout 2021. However, the trend has improved for the second half of the year. Most importantly, we have 0 serious accidents.
Our sickness absence rate is down from 4.8%- 3.9% this year, and that in a year heavily impacted by COVID. This represents a healthy organization, a productive and motivated organization. As you all know, infection rates are still high when it comes to COVID. NRC Group is in low season, and operational impact has been limited. However, we move closer to spring and closer to high season, so our exposure will increase. We believe NRC Group is in a unique position within our industry, building sustainable infrastructure. It's not only about the product, it's also about the process and how we contribute as a company. These are the six most important topics for NRC Group in order to build a sustainable company.
Of course, health and safety is a very important topic being a construction company, but it's also about building a diverse and including workforce. It's about training and developing our employees, making sure they have an interesting career path in NRC Group. It's also about our greenhouse gas emissions, where we have made concrete targets to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by 30% within 2024 and to become carbon neutral within 2050. We will continue the systematic work with these six topics in order to build a sustainable company, but this is also important enablers for us to reach our commercial goals. The EU Taxonomy will be important for how attractive it is to invest in NRC Group and other companies going forward.
We believe that the EU taxonomy will highlight NRC Group's uniqueness in the construction industry as we build sustainable infrastructure. Preliminary results for 2021 shows that 87% of our activities are eligible within the taxonomy. In 2021, 62% of the activities were aligned, and by continuing implementing measures, we believe that we can raise that number to above 70% going forward. NRC Group started out the year with a low order book, and that has, of course, impacted the revenues for the year. However, the trend has turned, and we realized a 7% organic growth for the quarter. The results are improving. The EBITDA is up NOK 60 million versus 2020 in the Q4 , and that is mainly due to improvements in the Norwegian business. We had M&A expenses of NOK 22 million in the quarter.
It's mainly related to legal expenses in a legal case against the sellers of Signal & Banbyggarna back in 2017, where we lost a court case in the district court this quarter. However, this judgment has been appealed. It's also related to an insurance claim from back in 2016 in the Finnish operation. We have seen high M&A costs in 2021, but we believe it will be significantly lower in 2022 and hopefully close to zero, unless we start new M&A transactions. Amortization for the quarter was NOK 19 million, NOK 8 million above the normalized level, and this is due to write-down of software in Finland. For 2022, we expect the level to be on a normalized level of NOK 40 million. Our balance sheet has been improving throughout the year, and we have a very strong cash position of NOK 626 million.
With a strong operating cash flow in Q4 , we have been able to reduce our net interest-bearing debt by NOK 93 million in the quarter. We will continue to work with our balance sheet in order to be as capital efficient as possible. The strong cash flow generation we saw in quarter three has continued into quarter four. For the year, we have realized a net operating cash flow of NOK 358 million versus NOK 312 million last year. For the quarter, we had a positive operating cash flow of NOK 149 million. Net financial items ended up at NOK -91 million, and that covers leasing, interest, and also installment on our loans. The cash flow from operating activities has been strong both in 2020 and 2021 and above our EBITDA.
For 2021, we also see a positive cash flow in total for the company. With a strong operating cash flow throughout the year, we have been able to reduce our net interest-bearing debt from NOK 1.2 billion starting the year to NOK 891 million end of year. Combined with increased profitability, we see that the ratio between net interest-bearing debt and adjusted EBITDA is down from 4.2- 2.7 ending the year. Getting closer to our long-term target of staying below 2.5 on this ratio. We have a solid financial position entering 2022. We have also seen a solid order intake in quarter four with significant wins. Some examples being the track renewal project in Sweden of SEK 195 million.
We also won the extension of the Tampere Tramway in Finland of EUR 250 million, and we also won the raw wood terminal project in Finland in Haapajärvi Oulainen of EUR 200 million. With a continued strong order intake, we end the year with an order book of NOK 7.8 billion, an increase of 20% versus last year. With a strong order book, we have a good starting point for 2022. We have already secured contracts for NOK 4.1 billion for this year, and compared to same period last year, that was NOK 3.4 billion. 2022 should be the year when we get back to a growth level we want to see in NRC Group.
To continue that growth beyond 2022, we need to make sure that we are even better at utilizing our Nordic capabilities and Nordic capacity to succeed in the market. We need to keep our market share within small and medium-sized projects. To get the growth rate we want, we also need to win more big projects. 2021 has been a very strong year in our Finnish operation, and we deliver strong profitability. In Norwegian currency, the revenues are somewhat down in quarter four. However, in local currency, we saw an organic growth of 3%. We delivered a strong EBITDA of NOK 59 million, representing an EBITDA margin of 8.3% in the quarter, and we delivered 8% for the full year.
This is due to strong performance in our light rail business and our rail construction business, and also some contribution from sales of machinery. We have seen a strong order intake in Finland in quarter four, winning important projects for all business lines, and I mentioned a few of them earlier. We also received an extension of two years for maintenance area four in Finland, and this is important for us to continue to build a solid maintenance business in Finland. When we look into 2022, the revenue mix will change somewhat in Finland. We have finished the first step of the Tampere Tramway project. In the Jokeri light rail project, the activity level will also be somewhat lower in 2022 versus 2021.
Even though we ramp up activities in the Crown Bridges project, the revenues from this segment will be somewhat lower in 2022. As you know, we like to be a bit more conservative booking profit early in the project cycle, so this might also impact the results for 2022 somewhat. As you know, we have had a low hit rate in new maintenance tenders throughout 2021 in Finland, so this will also impact the revenue on the negative side for next year. All in all, even though we start the year with a very strong order book in Finland, we expect a slight decrease in revenues for 2022 for the country as such. Tender pipeline in Finland is down in rail construction, both if we compare to last quarter and comparing one year ago.
However, we start the year with a very strong order book in this business, so we will realize growth in 2022. Comparing the tender pipeline and the expected investments level ahead, rail construction will provide us with good growth opportunities in Finland going forward. 2021 has also been a good year in NRC Group, where we finally see the positive development that we have worked hard to achieve. The strong order intake throughout the year is starting to show in revenues, and we see a 15% organic growth in the quarter. We deliver a good result with an EBITDA of NOK 21 million, representing a margin of 4.2%. This is good, especially when we compare to the situation one year ago.
In our demolition and recycling business, we are delivering margins on the level we want to see again in quarter four, and the improvement program we started one year ago has been successful. The environmental business, the rest of it, is also delivering a strong Q4 . In rail construction and civil construction, the low activity level still impacts results, but project execution is still strong. With improved activity level in 2022, margins and results should also improve from this part of the business. We have a very strong order book entering 2022, so we expect a strong increase in revenues in Norway, and we also expect improved margins for 2022. We still see a solid tender pipeline in the Norwegian market. We can be selective in which tenders we want to participate in.
As we move and focus more on bigger projects, the order intake might be a bit more volatile going forward. In Sweden, we have not yet been able to convert all the good work done into better results. We deliver a weak quarter with minus 21 in EBITDA, and we deliver a weak result for the year. The weak results for the year are mainly driven by a low activity level and further provisions on old projects. We see also in Sweden that the good order intake throughout the year is starting to show in revenues with a organic growth of 7% in the quarter, and we have a much better outlook for 2022 than what we have seen for the past couple of years. The order book for 2022 is up by 25% comparing to one year ago.
More important, we have a healthy order book consistent of projects won in 2020 and 2021. We still see fierce competition in the market, and our focus is to build a solid order book beyond 2022. We still see high tender activity within rail construction in Sweden. As you know, in our maintenance business, we have not won new contracts in 2021, and this is what impacts the order book beyond 2022. This year, three of our own contracts were expected to be tendered, and we submitted a bid on two of those in quarter four. We recently received news from our client that the tenders was canceled, and this, the likely outcome of that, is that we will keep those projects for one more year, securing the revenues at least in 2023. Nothing is final here.
We still await response from our client on how they will go forward with these two projects. The third contracts expected to be tendered in 2021 will be tendered this quarter, Q1 2021. If we look at the maintenance tenders in Sweden in 2021, the situation has been very unpredictable. We have tendered in total 10 contracts, and five of those tenders has been canceled after we submitted the bid. This will of course come back and be tendered later when the client is ready, but the situation has been unpredictable this year. To sum up Q4 , the continued good order intake throughout the year is starting to show in our revenues, and we saw a 7% organic growth in the quarter. We delivered improved profitability, mainly due to the improvements shown in Norway.
We delivered a strong order intake, and we delivered a strong cash flow from operations. If you look at the full year, we deliver a very strong result from our Finnish operations. We see a good improvement in the Norwegian business, but we still have some work left in Sweden. We start the year with a much better starting point than what we have seen for the past couple of years. We will, of course, continue the good work we are doing in order to improve our core processes in tendering and project execution. Our focus is on generating profitable growth. The tender pipeline is still strong, but we need to better utilize our Nordic competence and capacity to succeed in the market. The good operational and financial trend we have seen in 2021 is expected to continue for 2022.
We expect a moderate to strong growth in revenues and a moderate increase in EBIT margins compared to 2021. Thank you. Now we will open up for questions.
Yes, in English?
Yeah.
Yeah. You say moderate growth in EBIT margins. What is moderate, and what kind of ranges you think when you talk about moderate? It could be anything. Because if you look to the history, you only had very high margins. Now we have a few years with low. What are the relevant reference in terms of moderate EBIT recovery?
Yeah. I think what we commented on 2021 was that when comparing to 2020 and 2019 with the EBIT margins of 0.8% and 0.9%, we have seen a strong increase in EBIT margins to this year of 2.3%. That's an improvement of 1.5 percentage points. A moderate increase, that should be somewhere below that level.
Thank you.
Yep.
Hans-Erik Jacobsen, Nordea. In Sweden, your profitability in line with your competitors has been weak for a considerable time, and you said that you expect the competition to remain fierce. You don't see any consolidation or any of your competitors going out of business that could, you know, give some higher margins to those remaining?
Well, we have seen a tough market in Sweden for the past couple of years. Some competitors has been struggling, although we haven't seen sort of a wash out in the market. What tends to happen is that the players that are struggling are getting financed by new equity from private equity companies and other new owners putting capital into the operations. We haven't seen any material improvement in the competitive situation. We see that the projects we have won in 2020 and 2021 in the same fierce competition is profitable for us. If we are able to continue that trend going forward, we will be able to deliver better results in Sweden, even with this fierce competition.
Further on Sweden, the five contracts you said was canceled. Are you sure they are coming back?
They need to come back. Our client is a public client, and they need to tender all their activities.
Thank you.
Simon?
Thank you, Simon from DNB. The book-to-bill is very good year-over-year. If you look at the orders which are maturing 2020, they were up quite significantly when you see the maturity profile of the orders. When you say strong growth, can we look at the deviation of the order backlog and assume that is gonna be the growth for this year compared to last year's revenue in terms of the order intake and bread and butter experience and the volatility you spoke about?
Yeah.
Because there's a NOK 2 billion potential increase here in revenues 2020.
That is too optimistic, taking the comparable figures and just adding that as the growth rate in 2022. That's why we say we expect a moderate to strong growth. We are still early in the year, so we have contracted NOK 4.1 billion. Where we end up, if it's 7% growth, 10% growth, or 13% growth, that is a bit early to say. With the order book we have, we should see a moderate to strong growth. How we succeed with tenders for the next six months will of course provide the final answer to that.
Thanks.
I have two questions, if I can. We start with the long-term picture. You have removed the slide with the, your long-term ambition.
Mm-hmm.
Is that deliberately or? Yeah, any color on that?
Yeah.
The second question would be.
If you look at orders for execution in Finland, it's up compared to one year ago, but you are signaling that revenue will be lower.
Mm.
You have a good explanation, but could you talk a little bit about the drivers behind that?
Yeah. Let's start with the last one, first. The reason for why we say we expect a decrease in revenues is due to the falling revenues in the light rail business and in the maintenance business. We are not able to move those resources to rail construction and get the same or get fully compensated the revenues we lose. When we enter the year with a high order book in rail construction, our capacity to win new orders for this year is also a bit lower than what we saw one year ago. We could have grown more in the rail construction business, but we have tied up quite a bit of our capacity already. That's why we expect lower revenues. The first question as well, it's correct, that we have removed the picture.
We have not changed our ambition level, but as we have been saying throughout 2021, we are obviously delayed on reaching those targets. We will come back later this year, updating our financial ambitions going forward. There's no reason to decrease the ambition level, but obviously we are delayed on getting there. Yep.
Yes. I have a question regarding the unannounced order intake in the quarter, which was strong once again. Could you give us some color on how your clients are behaving these days? Is it very, sort of a very active dialogue in the sense that it seems like you are landing a lot of business on a short notice here these days?
Yeah. The unannounced order intake, that's of course win of smaller orders beyond the 30 million that we normally publish on the stock exchange. It's day-to-day business in some of our smaller companies like Gunnar Knutsen, the mass transportation company, the demolition and recycling business. Those are normally orders that are not big enough to be published on the stock exchange. Also a significant part of that is growth in existing projects. We have been receiving change orders that will grow the order book, and we have had some projects where we have seen a significant increase in scope impacting the order book in a positive way.
Are there any particular segments you would highlight, or is it more of a broad-based increase?
I think we can say it's more a broad-based increase.
Another question I had was on the capital structure. Are there sort of any things, any specific things you need to resolve in order to resume dividend payments? Because, I mean, the dividend policy has remained unchanged over the past couple of years. You have a bond that which will mature at some point. Are there any sort of details which have to be resolved there besides the net debt to EBITDA ratio within the target range?
Yeah. The main topic is, of course, to get a positive net income after tax. That is a prerequisite to pay the dividends. When you look at our bond agreement, we cannot pay more than 100% of our result as dividend. That is the first hurdle, to deliver a positive net income and that of course is our clear target in 2022. If we continue the development we see now, we will do that. Then there's also some other hurdles when it comes to leverage, et cetera, in both the bond and the bank agreement.
It's described in the prospectus when the bond was issued and in our annual reports, but there are some limitations on the debt side that we need to reach to pay dividends as well. The dividend policy is unchanged, and we will follow that as far as we reach those hurdles in those agreements.
A final question from me. On increased interest rates and potentially also inflation, could you just give us a brief comment on how that will impact your top line in terms of KPI adjustments on existing work, your cost base, and also potentially your net interest expense?
Yeah. To take the last one at least, our bond agreement is a fixed rate, so that should not be impacted as such. When it comes to our revenues, as you say, some of our contracts are indexed with relevant sort of construction KPI indexes. We get some increase by those indexes. Of course, when we calculate contracts, when we don't have full index compensation, we'll also take into consideration a normal increase in wages, et cetera, when we calculate. Of course, you will see some effects if wages suddenly get double of what is normal, but it will be a limited impact in the big picture in NRC Group.
I guess you have received a question on commodity prices earlier as well. You don't expect to see any material impacts?
No material impact. Of course, we have projects being impacted, but in total for NRC Group, this impact is also low as we also get a lot of our materials supplied by the client where the client has the risk of increased or decreased raw material prices. A limited effect when you compare to other construction companies and also the segment we are in with rail construction and civil construction. The use of material is much more less than if you compare to typical building companies that are much more exposed. This play a bit in our advantage.
Thank you. Good. How much is left of the goodwill amortization now to talk of that, because of the impact to reported figures that it's not?
Yeah, we don't, Rolf?
We have, I would say, about NOK 80 million or NOK 40 million next year and about NOK 40 million left.
Yeah. 80 million in total, NOK 40 next year, and then NOK 40 over the next years. Lene, do you have any questions from the-
I think it's crystal clear. No further questions.
That's good. Thank you for your participation and for good questions, and have a nice day.