Fruit picking, farming, horticulture and a possible Hawke's Bay wedding were topics of discussion during Thursday's visit to Hawke’s Bay by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern.

Ardern, along with minister for agriculture Damien O’Connor and minister for economic development, Stuart Nash, was attending the Food and Fibre Leaders meeting, along with a range of rural sector visits.

Set among the vines of Askerne Wines on the outskirts of Havelock North, Ardern was in deep discussions with farming leaders and horticulturalists on “issues they were facing” for most of the morning.

“For a long time we’ve wanted to get out and visit with them and their sectors on the ground,” she said.

The region faced another dry summer following on from last year, which saw pastures starved of rain until June.

But the prime minister’s visit was welcomed with a heavy dose of rain, one that the region's farmers had been crying out for.

The region has also been facing a labour shortage, particularly in the apple-picking sector, where the harvest is currently in full swing.

Yummy Apple manager Paul Paynter said “there just aren’t enough people, and it will be a total disaster in a month”.

“At the start it’s a Royal Gala monoculture, but later Braeburn, Granny Smith, Envy, Fuji, Pink Lady, Pacific Rose ... our peak here is forecast to be first week of April when I will need about another 140 pickers.”

Paynter said he was in a “better position than most” but the “small guys were in real trouble”.

Ardern said the government had been working hard to bring in additional workforce support for the industry.

“The fact we’ve taken the approach we have to Covid-19 has had some benefit to the sector as well, even if one of the bi-products has been labour shortages.”

In terms of the relocation grants for fruit pickers and the limited amount of workers who had accepted them, Ardern said there were reasons.

“You have to keep in mind that it’s often short-term work, people will have family members, existing accommodation that they’ll need to sustain and sometimes re-locating for a short period of time is quite a big hurdle.”

Ardern said the Government had also been working with assisting those seeking work within the sector in regions where there was a labour shortage.

O’Connor said it was the second season where Hawke’s Bay fruit growers had faced a labour shortage due to Covid-19 – and it “would be tough” particularly for the smaller growers.

“I've spoken to them and I think we’ll get through this. It’s really important that these small growers work with one another because they may not be picking on the same day.”

But it wasn’t just fruit picking and farming on the cards, as questions around Ardern's wedding revealed she wasn’t ruling out Hawke's Bay as a potential location, after Clarke Gayford proposed to her at Mahia.

“There’s a lot of pressure to make it local and why wouldn't I? It's a beautiful part of the country ... it wasn’t a no,” Ardern laughed.