UPDATE 1-India's vegetable oil stocks drop to 3-year low on lower palm imports

(Recasts paragraph 1, adds details and trader's comments) By Rajendra Jadhav MUMBAI, April 11 (Reuters) - Vegetable oil inventories in India fell to its lowest level in more than 3 years as palm oil imports in March stayed below average for the fourth straight month, a leading trade body said on Friday. Depleted stocks could force the world's biggest buyer of vegetable oils to increase imports of palm oil and soyoil in the coming months, supporting Malaysian palm oil prices FCPOc3 and U.S. soyoil futures Boc2 . Vegetable oil stocks at the start of April 1 fell 11.3% from a month ago to 1.67 million metric tons, the lowest since December 2021, the Solvent Extractors' Association of India (SEA) said in a statement. Palm oil imports in March rose about 14% from the previous month to 424,599 metric tons, the SEA said. India imported an average of more than 750,000 tons of palm oil each month during the marketing year that ended in October 2024. In the first five months of the 2024/25 marketing year ending in October, palm oil's share of India's total vegetable oil imports fell to 43% from 61%, while the combined share of soybean and sunflower oil rose to 57% from 39%. Palm oil's premium over soyoil led Indian buyers to reduce palm oil purchases and increase soyoil buying in the past few months, dealers said. Imports of soyoil rose 25% to 355,358 tons in March, while sunflower oil imports fell about 16% to 190,645 tons, the lowest in six months, it said. Total vegetable oil imports rose 11% to 998,344 million tons, the statement added. The country's imports in April is likely to rise marginally as purchase of palm oil and sunflower oil are expected to increase in the month, said Rajesh Patel, managing partner at GGN Research, an edible oil trader. India buys palm oil mainly from Indonesia and Malaysia, while it imports soyoil and sunflower oil from Argentina, Brazil, Russia and Ukraine. (Reporting by Rajendra Jadhav; editing by David Evans) ((rajendra.jadhav@thomsonreuters.com; Reuters Messaging: x.com/Rajendra1857))