For Julia, a 23-year-old retail customer service worker in Melbourne, a healthy, home-cooked meal is a rare luxury. Her roster at one of the city’s busiest supermarkets runs at least eight hours a day, five days a week. When she clocks off from a late shift, it’s the glow of McDonald’s or KFC near her apartment — not the kitchen — that beckons. 

“I know it’s bad,” she admits. “But it’s quick, it’s cheap, and I’m too exhausted to cook.” 

Julia’s story is far from unique. Dietitian Susie Burrell says the biggest predictor of ultra-processed food consumption among young Australians is availability. 

 “If you go to a healthier menu item and have steak and vegetables, it’s probably double or triple what a fast food meal would be,” she explains. “Human beings eat what’s available.” 

Ultra-processed foods are products high in additives, refined grains, sugars and oils that dominate shelves in supermarkets with attractive discounts. Social scientist Gyorgy Scrinis from the University of Melbourne says they are “cheap to produce, widely marketed, and designed for convenience,” making them hard to avoid.  

Fresh produce, meanwhile, has become increasingly expensive, and cooking from scratch is time-consuming.  

Faced with rising health concerns, many young people turn to TikTok’s “meal prep” trend with influencers showing off neatly packed, home-cooked lunches for the week. Julia tried it herself, bulk-buying ingredients and spending hours cooking on weekends. “It wasn’t cost-effective,” she says. “I still spent so much, and I don’t always have the time or energy to keep it up.” 

Burrell warns that, while meal prepping works for young people with money, kitchen skills and time, it’s unrealistic for the most vulnerable. “We’re dealing with the bottom 20-30 per cent, and they don’t have the money required to ‘meal prep’ because it’s complicated,” she says. “These people are surviving. They need to know what the best fast food meal is and what the best pre-made meal is at the supermarket.” 

Scrinis argues for systemic fixes. “Our whole food system has been transformed … reversing that is not going to be easy,” he says. “We’ve become dependent on corporations which produce ultra-processed convenience foods.”

He suggests solutions include subsidising fruit and vegetables, regulating marketing, and building “more communal, collective solutions” like food cooperatives. 

For now, Julia is trying small changes by swapping sugary drinks for water and choosing grilled instead of fried. However, the pull of convenience remains strong. “I want to eat better,” she says. “But when you’re tired, broke and busy, it feels like the system is stacked against you.” 

“We can’t leave it to individuals to solve,” Scrinis adds. “It’s a food system problem.”