Share the Spirit of Ramadan food drive aims to raise $17K for local charities

Muslims observing Ramadan gathered at Devonshire Mall on Sunday to hold a food and gift card drive for 17 Windsor food banks.

The 18th annual Share the Spirit of Ramadan food drive, organized by the Windsor Islamic Youth Council took place with days to go before Ramadan ends.

“We’re hoping to raise $17,000,” said coordinator, Sousan Khaled. “A thousand dollars for each charity.”

The 18th annual Share the Spirit of Ramadan food drive, organized by the Windsor Islamic Youth Council was held in Windsor, Ont. on Sunday, April 16, 2023. (Chris Campbell/CTV News Windsor)

Khaled said just under 16,000 bags of food had been donated over the first 14 years of the food drive and more than $70,000 in PC gift cards raised over the past three years.

“We found the charities preferred the gift cards so they can procure what they need for their food banks,” Khaled said.

“We have just a few days left until our end of the month celebration. And so we are fasting and we feel the plight of those less fortunate. We're actually fasting right now. Sunset, we’ll be breaking our fast on some food and not everybody's that fortunate. So we feel that and we hope that the food banks could benefit from this.”

Khaled said donations could still be made online if anyone was unable to attend the event at the mall.