Oil pumping resumes at Rena leak

Officials are working hard to resume the pumping of oil from the stricken Rena tanker off the coast of New Zealand after a previous attempt to salvage the vessel failed.

Maritime New Zealand spokesman Bruce Anderson confirmed that work has restarted to remove the last 1,200 tonnes of oil remaining on board the ship.

National on-scene commander Ian Niblock stated that volunteers are currently cleaning up beaches affected by the oil leak.

"Oil is occurring at natural collection points along the coast from Mount Maunganui to Maketu and we're using these collection points as a base for ongoing clean-up operations," he said.

Mr Anderson previously warned that more than 300 tonnes of oil may have been lost from the ship over the last few days.

But the country's transport minister Steven Joyce added that there is still a lot of work that needs to be done in order to contain the situation.