Soybean drops on weak palm oil, rapeseed arrivals

MUMBAI, March 3 (Reuters) - India soybean fell Tuesday as Malaysian palm oil prices fell and rapeseed arrivals peaked in top producer Rajasthan, analysts said.

Arrivals of India's main winter oilseed crop rose to 300,000 bags of 85 kg each on Monday, traders said, compared with about 100,000 bags two weeks ago.

At 11:07 a.m., April soybean NSBJ9 on the National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange fell 0.42 percent to 2,256.5 rupees per 100 kg.

But rapeseed futures reversed a weak open and rose on expectations that millers will stock up to meet annual requirements and as a section of traders believe demand will pick up as spot rates have recently seen a sharper fall than soybean.

Rapeseed and soybean are both oilseeds crushed to produce edible oils. However, rapeseed contains about 40-42 percent edible oil by weight, while soybean contains only about 17 percent.

June rapeseed was up 0.29 percent at 442.5 rupees per 20 kg. The contract had earlier touched a new low of 439 rupees.

The benchmark May palm oil KPOc3 on the Bursa Malaysia Derivatives Exchange was down on Tuesday morning. (Reporting by Abhishek Shanker; editing by Rohini Ananthan)