Wellington - Scientists warned tourists against travelling to White Island, New Zealand's biggest and most active volcano, on Thursday following an earthquake measuring 5.4 on the Richter scale which shook the region.

The quake was centred only five kilometres below the sea, 10 kilometres south-west of the island which sits nearly 50 kilometres off Whakatane on the east coast of the North Island.

Brad Scott, duty vulcanologist at the GeoNet organisation which monitors the country's seismic activity, told Radio New Zealand a large number of aftershocks made it difficult to establish immediately the state of the volcano.

As a result, the agency recommended against visits to the island until at least early next week.

Although the island is owned privately, more than 10,000 tourists go there every year on daily tours.

The island's volcano was in a state of frequent eruption between 1976 and 2000 and the crater is continually active.

About 70 per cent of the volcano is under the sea and GeoNet monitors its activity closely because a major eruption could create a tsunami that would devastate low-lying areas of the coast on the Bay of Plenty.

New Zealand's largest colony of gannets inhabit the island, which was named White by British explorer Captain James Cook in 1769 "because as such it always appeared to us." (dpa)