Voices is the Dorset Echo's weekly youth page - written for young people by young people.

This week Billy urges all of us to take responsibility for plastic pollution

The planet is engulfed by the toxin called plastic and the environment as we know it is deteriorating.

Our beautiful world is drowning in this pollutant and why? Every minute the equivalent of a truck full of litter is dumped into the sea.

This affects the marine wildlife as 2,270 marine species are endangered or threatened with extinction due to plastic.

I believe this is completely down to the laziness and selfishness of humans not bothering to recycle plastic. Worse than this are the companies selling their food products in this poisonous packaging.

Biodegradable materials take three to six years to decompose whereas their synthetic counterparts take up to 600 years to decompose.

It is not just marine wildlife that is being damaged but land wildlife as well. Paul Tillsley, head of the League Against Cruel Sports Charity said that becoming entangled in litter can be deadly to animals.

Are you happy to be responsible for an animal’s death? No? Then you need to reduce your plastic consumption and even sign up to litter picks.

Let us demand our milk be put back into glass bottles. Let us demand our supermarkets stop putting meat into oversized plastic containers and let us demand it now.

Now is the time to act, not when it is too late. We need to consider our environment as a priority. Plastic pollution is unacceptable. We need to change.

By Billy Sullivan