South Korea harnessed 16,000 water pumps to quench parched farmland and attached intravenous drips to trees lining Seoul’s boulevards while impoverished North Korea mobilized soldiers to combat the worst drought in more than a century in some parts of the peninsula.

As much as $43 million has been spent in South Korea to bring water to affected areas this month and another $60 million is on its way for drought mitigation, the agriculture ministry said in a statement today. In North Korea, the driest period in 105 years in the capital Pyongyang and the harshest conditions since the 1960s in surrounding provinces threaten harvests including wheat, barley, and potatoes, the official Korean Central News Agency said in dispatches this month.

Monsoon rains that may begin moving up the peninsula tomorrow come after prices in South Korea of napa cabbage, radishes, onions and green onion — four main ingredients of the national dish Kimchi — surged 138 percent from a year ago, according to an e-mailed report today from the Hyundai Research Institute in Seoul. The impact of the drought on consumer prices will continue for at least three months, the institute said.