How do innovation partners differ with respect to innovation type and stage in the innovation journey of farmers?

The locus of innovation is the network within which a farm is embedded. This paper investigates the relationships between network partners and innovation (types and stages in the process) in agriculture, which is unique in this field. In contrast to the majority of innovation studies, the authors also include marketing and organizational innovations and investigate the need for different partners along the innovation journey. The study is based on in-depth interviews with farmers. The findings provide useful research-related and managerial implications that enable farmers and network coordinators to improve the innovation capacity in agriculture via networking. The main conclusion is that, depending on the stage in the innovation journey and the type of innovation, different resources and hence different partners are needed. Therefore, farmers must be aware of the importance of partner suitability and network heterogeneity related to the type of innovation and stage in their innovation process.