Sponsor Tiny Feet Big Steps (TFBS)
Help Equip Africa’s Next Generation of Neonatal Leaders
Closing the Gap in Newborn Survival
Newborn survival remains one of the most urgent and solvable challenges in global child health. Half of all deaths among children under five occur during the first 28 days of life, and 2.3 million newborns die each year.
The challenge is not a lack of medical knowledge. Proven approaches to newborn care exist. The greater challenge is ensuring healthcare professionals have the practical training, mentorship, systems, and context-appropriate tools to deliver that care in resource-limited settings.
The Tiny Feet, Big Steps (TFBS) African Neonatology Conference was created to help close that gap.
Launched in 2021, TFBS equips physicians, nurses, and other healthcare professionals with practical, evidence-based approaches to caring for critically ill and premature newborns. Rather than importing models from high-income countries, TFBS draws on practices developed, tested, and refined by clinicians working in resource-limited African healthcare settings.
The results are extraordinary. The neonatal model ICHA now stewards and scales has contributed to more than 2,800 children being alive today, with greater than 92% survival among NICU admissions and 90% adjusted survival among premature infants above 25 weeks’ gestation.
Through TFBS, that knowledge and its lifesaving potential is being multiplied across Africa.
Building Capacity That Multiplies
Tiny Feet, Big Steps is more than an annual conference. It is a cornerstone of ICHA’s Capacity strategy: building a stronger African healthcare workforce by translating proven clinical experience into practical education that healthcare professionals can immediately apply in their own hospitals.
Since its launch, more than 1,000 African physicians and nurses have been trained across 240 hospitals in 22 African countries, with 6 conferences held in Arusha, Tanzania and 1 in Addis Ababa Ethiopia. TFBS has also expanded beyond Tanzania, reaching Ethiopia in 2025 and Kenya in November 2026.
TFBS uniquely brings physicians and nurses together for multidisciplinary training emphasizing clinical proficiency, innovation, quality improvement, and actionable strategies appropriate for resource-limited settings. Lectures are paired with interactive, hands-on skills workshops so participants leave not simply with new information, but with skills and approaches they can bring directly back to their patients and colleagues.
And the goal is not simply to bring international expertise to Africa. ICHA is deliberately building African leadership of neonatal education, with African faculty representation across TFBS targeted to reach at least 75% by 2028.
This creates a multiplier effect: train clinicians, strengthen hospitals, develop African faculty, and spread proven practices across healthcare systems.
Why Sponsor TFBS?
A sponsorship of Tiny Feet, Big Steps is an investment in the people who care for Africa’s most vulnerable newborns.
Sponsor support helps ICHA bring physicians, nurses, educators, and neonatal leaders together for high-quality clinical education; provide access for healthcare professionals who might otherwise be unable to participate; strengthen hands-on skills training; develop African faculty and clinical leaders; and extend proven neonatal practices into hospitals throughout the continent.
TFBS is part of a much larger vision. Through 2031, ICHA plans to expand its education and training platform through conferences, bedside mentorship, simulation-based learning, accredited curricula, and digital resources, including the Every Breath Counts manual and mobile app. ICHA’s strategic framework calls for 10 new TFBS conferences over five years, 250 professionals trained annually through its regional centre, and 20 partner hospitals mentored by 2031.
For sponsors, that means supporting more than a conference. It means helping build the clinical workforce, knowledge, leadership, and systems necessary to improve newborn survival across Africa.
Sponsorship Levels
The conference offers multiple levels of sponsorship, each providing a mix of high‑visibility opportunities such as presentations, workshops, exhibition space, public recognition, and branded promotion across banners and social media.
Diamond – $10,000
- 20-minute presentation in main lecture hall on organization’s activities and neonatology medical goods
- Opportunity to lead a workshop in area of expertise/highlighting product/s for conference attendees
- Prominent large-sized exhibition table at venue
- Public verbal recognition as diamond top-level sponsor by Conference Director
- Sharing of sponsorship slides/brief videos in between lectures
- Organization’s logo included prominently on printed banners
- Prominent acknowledgement as diamond top-level sponsor in social media advertising
Tanzanite – $7,500
- 10-minute presentation in main lecture hall on organization’s activities and neonatology medical goods
- Opportunity to lead a workshop in area of expertise highlighting product/s for conference attendees
- Prominent large-sized exhibition table at venue
- Public verbal recognition as tanzanite sponsor by Conference Director
- Sharing of sponsorship slides/brief videos in between lectures
- Organization’s logo included prominently on printed banners
- Prominent acknowledgement as tanzanite sponsor in social media advertising
Platinum – $5,000
- Prominent large-sized exhibition table at venue
- Acknowledgement as top-level sponsor in social media advertising
- 5-minute introduction to conference attendees in main lecture hall
- Public verbal recognition as platinum-level sponsor by Conference Director
- Organization’s logo included on printed banners
- Acknowledgement as top-level sponsor in social media advertising
Gold – $2,500
- Single exhibition table at conference venue
- Public verbal recognition as gold sponsor by Conference Director
- Acknowledgement in printed materials and social media advertising
- Organization’s logo included prominently on printed banners
Contact Us to Become a Sponsor
To become a sponsor, or to have your questions answered about sponsorship, please email the ICHA team at conference@tinyfeetbigsteps.com
Support Tiny Feet Big Steps Through a Personal Donation
If corporate sponsorship is not the right fit for you, we invite you to consider making a personal donation to support Tiny Feet Big Steps. Your contribution can help sponsor a Tanzanian doctor or nurse to attend the conference or provide an Every Breath Counts handbook to a healthcare professional caring for Africa’s smallest patients.
Sponsor a Doctor or Nurse
Many healthcare professionals cannot attend without financial assistance. Your sponsorship helps cover registration, accommodation, meals and conference materials.
Result: One clinician returns home equipped to improve care for hundreds of newborns
Equip Hospitals with Every Breath Counts
Help place practical neonatal care manuals into the hands of clinicians across Africa. Your support provides:
- Updated clinical protocols
- Practical bedside reference tools
- Every Breath Counts manuals
Continental Impact
Continental impact! That’s the vision behind every Tiny Feet Big Steps conference. Your investment does more than support an educational event—it creates a multiplier effect that extends across Africa.
- One physician returns home and improves clinical practice.
- One nurse strengthens an entire NICU team.
- One Every Breath Counts handbook becomes an essential resource for a hospital.
Together, these investments build stronger healthcare professionals, stronger hospitals, and healthier futures for children across the continent.
By partnering with Tiny Feet Big Steps, you’re investing in a model that transforms practical experience into practical knowledge—and practical knowledge into better care for thousands of children.
Questions
Questions about sponsorship can be directed to the ICHA team at conference@tinyfeetbigsteps.com