Vietnamese Nguyen Phuong Khanh beat 86 other contestants to win Miss Earth 2018 on the final night on Saturday, becoming the first beauty of her country to take the crown at one of the Big Four international pageants.

The show in the Philippines began with the beauties from 87 countries and territories touring the stage to greet the audience, before the hosts announced the Top 18, where the Vietnamese representative shone in a golden gown and made it to the next round.

Khanh, born in the Mekong Delta province of Ben Tre in 1994, was the second runner-up at the Miss Ocean Vietnam Global in April.

She is 1.7 meters tall, weighs 51kg, with body measurements of 90-58-94 cm.

Before the decisive Saturday evening, the 24-year-old woman was already predicted to make it to the Top 10.

The Vietnamese lady was able to show her best in the bikini round.

With a good command of English, Khanh gave a convincing short speech in the presentation segment to have her name called for the last four finalists.

In the judges' question round for the Top 4, Khanh was confident to express her opinion about what she thought was the greatest pressure on her generation.

The beauty answered it was ignorance, reasoning that people of her generation tend to use too much technology and social media and "we just care about ourselves."

The young Vietnamese suggested that people "should spend our time thinking about what's happening with the earth right now."

The hosts then announced the Miss Water title, equivalent to second runner-up, which went to Valeria Ayos of Colombia and Miss Air, or first runner-up, to Melanie Mader from Austria.

Instead of naming the third runner-up for Miss Fire, the hosts directly revealed Khanh as the winner of Miss Earth 2018.

The remaining title, Miss Fire, went to Melissa Flores from Mexico.

Nguyen Phuong Khanh answers her question.

This is Vietnam's highest achievement in one of the four major international beauty pageants, with the other contests being Miss World, Miss Universe, and Miss International.

Miss Earth is an annual international environmental-themed beauty pageant promoting environmental awareness, which was initiated by Philippine conglomerate Carousel Productions in 2001.

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